Using maps created in 1866 by a British explorer and passages from the Jewish Mishnah, an Israeli archaeologist and professor at Hebrew University says he has pinpointed the location of the sacred Jewish Temple, twice built and twice destroyed in ancient times.

JERUSALEM – Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's reported decision to allow Muslims to construct a massive minaret on the Temple Mount will "serve to solidify Islam's take over of Judaism's holiest site," a leading Israeli archaeologist charged in a WND interview.

Member of Sanhedrin says sacrifices 'were not possible when the people of Israel were in the Diaspora, but now they are.' Adds: Jerusalem Temple should be rebuilt, Israeli government standing in our way

Yaakov Lappin Published: 03.01.07, 19:49 / Israel News

Animal sacrifices should be renewed on the Temple Mount, a member of the radical Sanhedrin organization told Ynetnews.

In ancient Israel and Judea, the Sanhedrin served as the highest court in the land, and was made up of 71 top judges. Now, a group of fringe rabbis say they have reformed the group, although the organization has received no recognition from Israel's official religious authorities

"In the Torah there are around 200 commandments dealing with animal sacrifices," said Rabbi Dov Stein, of the Sanhedrin organization. "The Torah of Israel demands animal sacrifices. When the people of Israel were in the Diaspora, it couldn’t be done. But now, there is the supreme institution, the Sanhedrin, made up of experts, and it can be done. The new Sanhedrin, like the old, will educate the people of Israel on how to keep and safeguard the Torah."

Democracy was not invented today

Stein vowed that "we will try to carry out animal sacrifices on the Temple Mount this Passover, as commanded by the Torah."

Asked if his organization sought to rebuild the third Temple, Stein's answer was unequivocal. "We want to establish the Temple again. Unfortunately, standing in our way is a hostile regime, the Israeli government, and rabbis who for political interest don't want this to happen."

Stein even suggested that Muslims would agree to the project, saying: "The Omar Mosque (the Dome of the Rock), built by Khalif Omar, was actually intended to safeguard the site for the Jews. Islam hasn't always been so hostile. Despite its hatred and massacres against us, Islam sees in Judaism a source and a guide. I think the moment will come that Muslims understand the need to build the Temple and go along with us."

Stein outlined his plan for Israel, calling for a king to be appointed democratically. "Democracy was not invented today, the king is elected from a list of candidates. A senior judge, as was done during the days of the judges, can also be appointed," he added.

However, such practices ended 2000 years ago, Rabbi Doniel Hartman was quoted by the Associated Press as saying.

"Around that time, animal sacrifice, as a mode of religious worship, stopped for Jews, Christians and Muslims," said the rabbi from the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, according to AP. "Moving back in that direction is not progress," he added.

According to mainstream Jewish thought, animal sacrifices must not be carried out outside of Temple, which itself cannot be rebuilt by human endeavor, but will be rebuilt upon the arrival of the messiah.

A wall from the First Temple was recently uncovered in Jerusalem's City of David, strengthening the claim that it is the site of the palace of King David, an Israeli archeologist said Thursday.

The new find, made by Dr. Eilat Mazar, a senior fellow at the Shalem Center's Institute for the Archeology of the Jewish People, comes less than two years after she said she had discovered the palace's location at the site just outside the walls of the Old City.

The monumental 10th century BCE building found by Mazar in 2005 following a six month dig has ignited debate among archaeologists about whether it is indeed the palace built for the victorious David by King Hiram of Tyre as recounted in Samuel II:5.

A 20-meter-long section of the 7-meter-thick wall has now been uncovered. It indicates that the City of David once served as a major government center, Mazar said.

Mazar estimates less than a quarter of the entire wall has been uncovered so far, and says that it is the largest site from King David's time ever to have been discovered.

The dig is sponsored by the capital's Shalem Center, with academic backing from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

The Temple Mount and Land of Israel Faithful Movement made on April 5th, 2007 for the first time since the Temple was destroyed by the Romans in the year 70 CE the Pesach pilgrimage to the southern Hulda Gates of the holy Temple Mount, carrying the “omer” through their gates to the Temple Mount as an offering to the G–d of Israel exactly as He called us to do in His Word. The harvest “omer”, which is the first harvest cut from the fields of Israel was cut by the Faithful Movement in the fields of Israel exactly as the G–d of Israel commanded us.

The southern gates of the Temple Mount were called since the time of the First Temple the Hulda Gates. They were built by King Solomon around the year 1000 BCE and were rebuilt and remodeled by King Herod during the years 91 BCE to 2 CE. These gates were in the First and the Second Temple the main entrance of the Israeli pilgrims to the Temple Mount on their way to worship in the Temple. These major gates to the Temple Mount were called by the name of the prophet Hulda, that was one of the most important prophets of Israel. She prophesied at the time before the building of the First Temple and was very much appreciated and beloved by the people of Israel.

Jerusalem of the First Temple age, since the time of King David, was located on the southern downward slope of the Temple Mount. The Temple was built and placed on the top of Mount Moriah while the City of David was below the peak of the mountain which is very steep. The pilgrims had to walk on their feet all the way on the steep mountain from the very deep valley of the City of David to the peak of the mountain where the Temple was located. This is the reason that the walking up of the pilgrims to the Temple was called “pilgrimage”, when they did it on the three major festivals of Pesach, Shavout and Succoth, exactly as the G–d of Israel commanded them to do three times a year at these festivals: “Thrice in the year shall all your males appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel. For I will cast out the nations before you, and enlarge your borders; nor shall any man desire your land, when you shall go up to appear before the Lord your God thrice in the year” (Exodus 34).

As we see the G–d of Israel promised His people that nobody will have even a desire to take from them the land of Israel that He gave them in an eternal covenant if they will make this pilgrimage to His holy mountain three times a year in the three major festivals. Unfortunately, now when the leadership of Israel is too weak politically and spiritually and do not have the vision and could not trust this Word of G-d to rebuild His holy Temple and to renew the worship in the house of G-d and the pilgrimage three times a year, so many nations, powers, and especially the Islamic nations have a deep desire for the land of Israel given by G-d to His people Israel only. As we see they did not stop to fight against Israel with an intention to take from the people of G-d the Promised Land. The Temple Mount and Land of Israel Faithful Movement is preaching and making for many years a campaign for the immediate rebuilding of the Temple which will fulfill on one hand the call of G-d to our generation to rebuild His house on Mount Moriah and on the other hand will avoid the desire of so many powers and nations to rob from Israel the land and will establish a real godly peace in the holy land of Israel and all over the world. The pilgrimage of the Faithful Movement on Pesach 2007 was an important part and stage of this historical campaign.

It was one of the most exciting views in the biblical times when many, many thousands or even millions of Israeli pilgrims walked, families, families with their children, from the City of David especially, up to the Temple Mount through the Hulda Gates. They were dressed with special beautiful biblical garments, mainly with white colored garments which reflected purity, to honor the G–d of Israel that His Shekinah dwelled in the Holy of Holies of the Temple. They carried in their hands the first portion of the harvest that they cut from their fields and carried it to the Temple as an offering to their beloved G-d and Creator. The harvest was taken to the priest that lifted it on the alter before G-d as an offering of the family. Giving the first cut harvest on Pesach and Shavout (on Shavout also the first fruits from the trees), had a special exciting significance. The meaning was: Give the first fruits of your ground to the G–d of Israel before you take fruits that you worked on them for yourself. By this way you gave thanks and love to G-d Who gave you food, bread, fruits and blessed you by giving you your living. It was the request from the G–d of Israel Himself to His people Israel to show their love to Him in this exciting way: “And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Speak to the people of Israel, and say to them, When you come to the land which I give to you, and shall reap its harvest, then you shall bring a sheaf of the first fruits of your harvest to the priest; And he shall wave the sheaf before the Lord, to be accepted for you; on the next day after the Sabbath the priest shall wave it” (Leviticus 23: 9-11).

Just recently was discovered during the archeological excavations in the City of David an exciting discovery. It was in the biblical times the main street from below the City of David up to the southern gates of the Temple Mount. On this way walked the pilgrims and the Israeli worshippers up to the Temple Mount carrying on their hands the offerings and the sacrifices to the G–d of Israel. This was an incredible discovery (I shall write another special article that will share this incredible discovery from the biblical era). The pilgrims of the Temple Mount Faithful Movement were so excited just to think that on the steps of this street walked their forefathers and millions of Israelis up to the Temple Mount in the biblical times on their way to worship in the Temple of the G–d of Israel.

The Temple Mount and Land of Israel Faithful Movement renewed this exciting event of the biblical times when we walked on Pesach 2007 with the “omer” offering on our hands on the same steps to the southern Hulda Gates of the Temple Mount to bring it to the G–d of Israel. The Shekinah of G-d never moved from the Temple Mount even after the destruction of the Temple until today. Never before since the destruction of the Second Temple Israelis walked on these steps with the "omer" offering in their hands and it had a special significance in the history of Israel at this time. It was another major step towards the building of the Third Temple and an important stage in the campaign and work of the Temple Mount and Land of Israel Faithful Movement on her way to rebuild the end-time Temple of G-d.

The southern Hulda Gates of the Temple Mount are still blocked. The Muslims blocked them after their occupation of the land of Israel, Jerusalem and the Temple Mount in the 7th century CE. When we came with the "omer" offering to the five Hulda Gates we could still see a part of the beautiful arch on one of the gates and the frames of the other gates. We still could find and see the heavy huge Herodian stones on the southern wall of the Temple Mount. We could touch with our own hands and hearts these holy stones of the Temple Mount that our forefathers built and touched. We could close our eyes and see in the eyes of our spirit the Israeli pilgrims walking up from the City of David to the holy mountain of G-d on their way to show their love to the G–d of Israel in His holy house and to feel His love to them and His touch on their hearts. Despite that we could not enter through the blocked Hulda Gates to the Temple Mount we felt that the G–d of Israel, His Shekinah, came out of the Temple Mount to welcome us in front of His holy mountain and to encourage us on our godly historical campaign to rebuild His house and open the gates for His people Israel. We felt His presence so strongly among us and so deeply in our hearts. We swore before G-d, when we made the ceremony of the “omer” offering, that we shall not rest day and night until His house is rebuilt and until He will again dwell among His people Israel and this time among all His creation all over the world exactly as He asked us to do in His holy Word: “And let them make me a Temple; that I may dwell among them” (Exodus 25:8). We felt that a major historical circle was closed when we heard and felt the great prophetic Word of G-d to His people Israel by the prophets Isaiah and Micah to be heard by all mankind and to be fulfilled in the life of our end-time generation:

“The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem. And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established on the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow to it. And many people shall go and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths; for from Zion shall go forth Torah, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And he shall judge among the nations, and shall decide for many people; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, nor shall they learn war any more. But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them afraid; for the mouth of the Lord of hosts has spoken it” (Isaiah 2: 1-4 and Micah 4:1-4).

The Temple Mount and Land of Israel Faithful Movement is deeply committed and anointed to bring to pass this prophetic Word and vision of the G–d of Israel in our lifetime. Only the removing of the enemy of the G–d and the people of Israel (and as we see now it is also the enemy of all mankind), the purification of the Temple Mount and the rebuilding of the Temple of G-d to be a house of prayer, worship and love, will bring a real peace to Israel and all the world (see the above godly vision of the prophets Isaiah and Micah).

The Temple Mount Faithful Movement called at this special event on the government of Israel to immediately open all the Hulda Gates for pilgrims and worshippers to be again the main entrance to the holy Temple Mount of G-d. This should be the first stage and after it will come the other stages as mentioned above.

Everyone in Israel and all over the world is called at this special godly time when the kingdom of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is rebuilt by Israel and the Faithful Movement, in the land of Israel, to stand with Israel and the Faithful Movement and to help them on their great godly campaign to bring it to pass in our lifetime and to fulfill the expectations of G-d from our generation.

JERUSALEM - An Israeli archaeologist on Tuesday said he has found remnants of the tomb of King Herod, the legendary builder of ancient Jerusalem, on a flattened hilltop in the Judean Desert where the biblical monarch built a palace.

Hebrew University archaeologist Ehud Netzer said the tomb was found at Herodium, a site where he has been exploring since the 1970s.

Netzer said a team of researchers found pieces of a limestone sarcophagus believed to belong to the ancient king. Although there were no bones in the container, he said the sarcophagus' location and ornate appearance indicated it is Herod's.

"It's a sarcophagus we don't just see anywhere," Netzer said at a news conference. "It is something very special."

Netzer led the team, although he said he was not on the site when the sarcophagus was found.

Stephen Pfann, an expert in the Second Temple period at the University of the Holy Land, called the find a "major discovery by all means," but cautioned further research is needed.

He said all signs indicate the tomb belongs to Herod, but said ruins with an inscrïption on it were needed for full verification.

"We're moving in the right direction. It will be clinched once we have an inscrïption that bears his name," said Pfann, a textual scholar who did not participate in Netzer's dig.

The fragments of carved limestone found at the sandy site are decorated with floral motives, but do not include any inscrïptions.

Herod became the ruler of the Holy Land under the Romans around 40 B.C. The wall he built around the Old City of Jerusalem during the time of the Jewish Second Temple is the one that can be seen today. He also undertook massive construction projects in Caesaria, Jericho, the hilltop fortress of Massada and other locations.

It has long been assumed that Herod was buried at Herodium, but decades of excavations failed to turn up the site until now. The first century historian Josephus Flavius described the tomb and Herod's funeral procession.

Herodium was one of the last strong points held by Jewish rebels fighting against the Romans, and it was conquered and destroyed by Roman forces in A.D. 71, a year after they destroyed the Second Temple in Jerusalem.

Hebrew University had hoped to keep the find a secret until Netzer's news conference on Tuesday. But the university announced the find in a brief statement late Monday after the Haaretz daily found out about the discovery and published an article on its Web site.

Petra is the most amazing empty ghost town in the world, and we believe, the hiding place of God's Jewish Elect during the last half of the Tribulation Period, the Great Tribulation. Petra is mentioned more times in the Bible than any other city, with the exception of Jerusalem. You will be amazed at the volume of scrïpture mentioning this rock city of 30 square miles, located in southern Jordan just a few miles from Israel's border. When God delivers His 1/3 remnant from the clutches of Antichrist to Petra, He will get the glory and the honor. His witness of Israel as His Chosen Nation will be upheld, and His prophecy proven true.

To order : http://cuttingedge.org/detail.cfm?ID=401

mariaAdministrateur Messages postés : 20960

Posté le 17/06/2007 18:04:20

ARTIFACTS FROM TIME OF KINGS DAVID AND SOLOMON REVEALED[/g]

by Nissan Ratzlav-Katz

(IsraelNN.com) In honor of Jerusalem Day, which begins Tuesday night, archaeologists revealed a number of seals from the time of the Biblical Kings David and Solomon. The seals, along with other recently uncovered artifacts, were displayed for the first time on Monday, at a conference marking 40 years since the liberation and reunification of Jerusalem by the modern State of Israel.

The City of David area was a commercial and trading center.conference marking 40 years since the liberation and reunification of Jerusalem by the modern State of Israel

The Bible-period artifacts were unearthed during archaeological excavations underway in Ir David, the City of David, below Jerusalem’s Old City to the east. The specific artifacts on display on Monday were found at the Beit HaMaayan (well-house) dig, overseen by Haifa University's Archaeology Department Director, Professor Ronny Reich.

The greatest scientific and public interest was focused on more than 100 seals and signet rings, used as a means of authentication for written papyrus documents, from the time of the reigns of Kings David and Solomon. The seals bear various markings that, when deciphered, indicate the sender of the document and his or her location. The large number of such seals, archaeologists explained, indicate that the City of David area was a commercial and trading center.

Several hundred leaders of Israel's industry and the economy took part in the Jerusalem gathering at which the artifacts were displayed.

Similar seals and signets have been found at various excavation sites around Jerusalem over the past decade. Some of those seals bear names of royal advisors and servants mentioned in various Biblical accounts of the reigns of Jewish monarchs.

In 2005, a Hebrew University archaeologist and a leading authority on ancient Jerusalem. Some seals bear the names of royal advisors mentioned in various Biblical accounts.

Dr. Eilat Mazar uncovered a clay seal in what she claimed served as the residential palace of Jewish kings from King David until the destruction of the First Temple, for a period of 450 years. That seal, dated from about 580 BCE, bears the name Yehuchal Ben-Sheleimiya, who is identified as a royal envoy and court minister sent by King Zedekiah to the prophet Jeremiah (in chapters 37 and 38 of the Bible's Book of Jeremiah).

Several years earlier, another circa-580 BCE royal seal was found at the same site. It had the name of Gemaryahu, son of Shafan, who is also mentioned in the Book of Jeremiah, and who was a top official in the court of King Zedekiah's predecessor, King Yehoyachim. Another seal found among dozens of others bears the name of Azaryahu Ben-Hilkiyahu, a member of a priestly family, who served in the Temple before Jerusalem's destruction (according to I Chronicles, 9:10).

IT'S BIGGER THAN SADDAM'S PALACE AND, WITH A CINEMA, GYM AND POOL, IS THE SAFEST AND SMARTEST PLACE TO LIVE IN IRAQ...

The TimesSeptember 1, 2007

Martin Fletcher in Baghdad

Baghdad is a city of ruins - of burnt-out homes, of shops wrecked by suicide bombs, of the crumbling shells of Saddam-era palaces and ministries destroyed by smart bombs in the US invasion of 2003.

There is one notable exception. It is probably the only big new building project in the capital in the past four years. It is the new US Embassy on the west bank of the Tigris which the contractors will transfer to the US Government officially today.

A towering wall renders the huge new embassy almost invisible from ground level. For security reasons the State Department has refused all requests for media tours – promising instead to release pictures of the interior at some later date. The only way to view it is from the roof of the Babylon hotel, across the river.

What you can see through the haze of heat and pollution is a complex of two dozen smart new dun and grey blocks set in 104 acres (42 hectares) of grounds ringed by that impregnable wall. It is a fortress within the fortress that is the green zone. It is designed to repel any physical attack and. when it opens for business in a few weeks, it will be protected by a detachment of Marines with their own barracks. It is not, however, invulnerable to criticism.

This is the largest US Embassy built – roughly the size of Vatican City – and at $600 million (£300 million) the most expensive. At a time when millions of Baghdadis outside the green zone receive only a couple of hours of water and electricity daily, Iraqis observe that this project has been completed on time, on budget, and is entirely self-sufficient with its own fresh water supply, electricity plant, sewage treatment facility, maintenance shops and warehouses.

“People are very angry,” said one young Iraqi. “It’s for the Americans, not for the Iraqis.”

There are two office blocks that will house 1,000 staff, six apartment blocks containing 619 one-bedroom units, spacious residences for the Ambassador and his deputy, a school, shopping centre and food court; a swimming pool, tennis and basketball courts; a gymnasium, cinema, beauty salon and social club. This is known because the architects – Berger Devine Yaeger, of Kansas City – posted drawings on its website briefly until the State Department ordered their removal.

The embassy was built with imported labour. This year a congressional committee heard charges that First Kuwaiti General Trading & Contracting told a planeload of Filipino construction workers that they were flying to Dubai to build hotels and did not admit that they were heading for Baghdad until they had taken off, forcing them, in effect, to work there.

Critics also portray the new compound as a symbol of American isolation and occupation, and a sign of how little confidence the US has in Iraq’s future. Jane Loeffler, an expert on the architecture of embassies, writes in the latest edition of Foreign Policy magazine: “Encircled by blast walls and cut off from the rest of Baghdad, it stands out like the crusader castles that once dominated the Middle East.”

Embassies were traditionally designed to promote interaction with their host communities, she says, but not this one. “Although US diplomats will technically be ‘in Iraq’ they may as well be in Washington.

“Although the US Government regularly proclaims confidence in Iraq’s democratic future, the US has designed an embassy that conveys no confidence in Iraqis and little hope for their future. Instead, the US has built a fortress capable of sustaining a massive, long-term presence in the face of continued violence.”

Edward Peck, a former US Ambassador to Iraq, says in the same magazine: “The embassy is going to have a thousand people hunkered behind sand-bags. I don’t know how you conduct diplomacy in that way.”

US diplomats roll their eyes in the face of such verbal assaults. “The size and scale of the embassy reflects very much our expectation of a strong long-term relationship with Iraq,” one senior official insisted. “Of course it’s a fortress. What embassy isn’t nowadays? Is it a tragedy? Of course it is. It’s a sad statement of the reality of today’s world.”

The relentless criticism clearly grates. “We call it the ‘nec’,” he said. “It stands for the new embassy compound. And it’s a pain in the neck.”

(IsraelNN.com) The Antiquities Authority announced today that it has found the quarry that supplied the giant stones for the building of the Temple Mount. The quarry is located in what is now one of Jerusalem's newest neighborhoods, Ramat Shlomo (also known as Reches Shuafat), between Ramot and French Hill. The quarry was found in the course of an archaeological rescue dig prior to the construction of a neighborhood school.

The ancient quarry is spread out over at least five dunams (1.25 acres), with rocks up between three and eight meters long - the size of those that can still be seen today at the foundations of the Temple Mount and in the Western Wall - hewn out of the ground.

Divine Regards

Rabbi Chaim Richman of the Temple Institute in Jerusalem told Arutz-7 that the discovery of the quarry was both historically dramatic and spiritually exhilarating: "Precisely now, when the Moslems are trying to erase all vestiges of the presence of our Holy Temple, and when even among our own leaders there is a trend towards giving it away and viewing it as an unnecessary burden - precisely now, with this discovery, G-d is sending the Jewish People a kiss, as if to say, 'Don't worry, I haven't forgotten you; there are those who want to give it [the Temple Mount] away or take it away from you, but I still have big plans for both you and for the Holy Temple - and the Temple will yet become the focal point of the world once again."

Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupoliansky has ordered a halt to the school-building plans, budgeting 350,000 shekels ($86,500) for the archaeological work.

Jerusalem archaeologist Yuval Baruch told Arutz-7 that the ancient hewing was done in stages. First, deep and narrow trenches were dug around the four sides of what was to be the rock. Then, dozens of small picks were used to make holes underneath, at a distance of several centimeters from each other, until the rock was able to be separated from the ground. Archaeologists found one such pick in the area - a 15-centimeter (6-inch) long metal object.

Gideon Charlap, a top Jerusalem architect and Temple Mount expert, told Arutz-7 that while rocks for the Temple may not be hewn with iron on the Temple Mount, iron may be used on the rocks before they reach the Mount. This, as opposed to stones used for the Temple's altar, which are never permitted to be hewn with iron.

The rulers of ancient Jerusalem used top-quality, beautiful stone for their public buildings, of the type they called Malcha (from the word for royalty). Dozens of quarries have been discovered in and around Jerusalem over the years, Baruch said, "including some from the period of Herod, like this one. However, never before has one been found with such large rocks."

The Shuafat mountain is some 80 meters higher than the Temple Mount. That, and its proximity to the main road to Jerusalem from the north made this quarry a prime candidate to provide the rocks to be used in the city's important buildings. Teams of oxen pulled the giant stones down the moderate incline towards the city. The rocks were then placed upon the bedrock, forming the foundation of the Temple Mount, and keeping it stable and firm without the use of concrete even up until today.

Coins and pottery were also found in the quarry, dating back 1,900 years - further evidence that this quarry was used during the height of construction in ancient Jerusalem.

Ancient Drainage Tunnel and Escape Route Found

Earlier this month, the Antiquities Authority announced the discovery of the City of David's main drainage channel - later used by Jerusalem residents when they tried to flee from the Romans. The channel is located along the route from the Temple Mount to the Shiloah Pool, and apparently continues on to Nahal Kidron on its way to the Dead Sea. It drained the rainfall of ancient Jerusalem - the Jewish quarter, the western region of the City of David, and the Temple Mount. The excavations were jointly carried out by the Israel Antiquities Authority and the Elad Association.

The excavation directors wrote, ï¿½There is evidence in the writings of Josephus Flavius, the historian who described the revolt, the conquest and the destruction of Jerusalem, that numerous people took shelter in the channel and even lived in it for a period until they succeeded to flee the city through its southern end."

The massive U.S. embassy under construction in Baghdad could cost $144 million more than projected and will open months behind schedule because of poor planning, shoddy workmanship, internal disputes and last-minute changes sought by State Department officials, according to U.S. officials and a department document provided to Congress.

IsraelNN.com) The Temple Institute in Jerusalem announces the completion of the Tzitz, the High Priest's headplate - now ready for use in the Holy Temple.

The tzitz is made of pure gold, was fashioned over the course of a more than a year by the craftsmen of the Temple Institute, and is ready to be worn by the High Priest in the rebuilt Holy Temple in Jerusalem.

Rabbi Chaim Richman, International Director of the Temple Institute http://www.templeinstitute.org/events.htm , explained to Arutz-7 that until it can actually be used, the tzitz will be on view in the Institute's permanent exhibition display, together with other vessels and priestly garments fashioned for use in the Holy Temple by the Institute.

Legal Aspects: Impurity and Hekdesh

Rabbi Yisrael Ariel, Director of the Institute, explained some of the Halakhic [Jewish legal] aspects of the fashioning of the vessels for the Temple. "For one thing," he said, "they are made in impurity - for now we are impure, and will remain impure until we are able to have a Red Heifer whose ashes can be used in the Torah-prescribed purification ceremony. If no Red Heifer is available, then the High Priest must even serve in the Holy of Holies on Yom Kippur in a state of impurity."

Asked whether the fact that the vessels are dedicated for the Temple does not render them hekdesh (consecrated) and therefore forbidden for any other use, Rabbi Ariel explained, "There are two stages. First of all, we make it very clear to the donors and to the craftsmen that the ultimate purpose of these vessels is not to be used for exhibitions or the like, but rather for the fulfillment of Torah commandments in the Holy Temple. They must know this in advance. However, to gain the actual status of hekdesh, we similarly make it clear that this does not happen until the vessel is actually brought in to the Temple Mount for use in the Temple. This means that someone can try on and measure the headplate, for example, without worrying that he is benefiting in any way from something that has been consecrated to the Temple."

Menorah Moves Closer to Temple Mount

Rabbi Richman noted that in less than two weeks from now, on Rosh Chodesh Tevet, the famous Menorah (candelabrum) - suitable for use in the Holy Temple, familiar to visitors to the Cardo section of the Old City of Jerusalem - will be relocated to the landing of the wide staircase that leads down from the Jewish Quarter to the Western Wall. It will be protected inside the same type of glass structure that now houses it.

The new tzitz is an improvement on one made several years ago, in that it has a backpiece, in accordance with some commentators and the account of Josephus. In addition, it has a locking mechansim so that it will not slip off the Priest's head, and can be adjusted to fit heads of different sizes. The old one will be preserved, of course as a "spare," in keeping with the Mishnaic account that several models of various vessels were kept in the Temple, in case the need arose to replace one.

Asked what project they're working on at present, Rabbi Richman said, "We have begun work on 120 sets of garments for 'regular' priests, not the High Priest. This involves special thread from India, etc. In addition, we have begun work on architectural blueprints for the Third Temple, including cost projection, modern supplies, electricity, plumbing, computers, etc."

Bringing G-d Into Our World

"At present," Rabbi Richman explained, "people are in despair, and wonder if we're not dreaming futilely while around us our leaders are planning to give the country away. We say to them: It appears that those who went to Annapolis are the dreamers, thinking that their efforts to make peace will succeed, or that the public is with them in their efforts to give away our Jerusalem, our Temple Mount, and other national historic assets."

"We are now approaching the holiday of Chanukah," Rabbi Richman continued, "which is the holiday that commemorates the re-dedication of the Holy Temple. We're not just building beautiful vessels; we're interested in granting G-d the dwelling place that He wants in this world; the Temple is not merely a building, but a way of bringing G-d into our lives in a very real way. And that is what we aim to do. This tzitz is G-d's Chanukah present to us, and our Chanukah gift to the Jewish People."

It marks the second time the Palestinians attempted to burn down the tomb, located near Nablus, the biblical city of Shechem.

Joseph's Tomb is the believed burial place of the biblical patriarch Joseph, the son of Jacob who was sold by his brothers into slavery and later became viceroy of Egypt.

Palestinian security officials in Nablus said yesterday they were called to the tomb to find 16 burning tires inside the sacred structure.

A Palestinian police official who inspected the site told WND today there was some fire damage to the tomb. He said the Palestinian Authority, fearing embarrassment, immediately formed a joint committee from the PA's Force 17, Preventative Security Services and Palestinian intelligence, to find out who was behind the fire.

He said patrols were stepped up around the site.

A spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces said the IDF was not aware of the fire or any unusual activity near the tomb but that it would immediately inquire with the PA.

In our last newsletter, we examined the route taken by Moses and the great multitude as they fled Egypt. We will now examine the evidences which tell us exactly who were the Egyptian royalties involved and the approximate date the Exodus occurred. This is a subject that gets quite involved and we will only be able to present a bare frame of reference in this publication. Bear with us, as we will attempt to present a large amount of information in a short space.

THE CHARIOT WHEELS

We will begin with the chariot wheels that Ron and the boys found in the Gulf of Aqaba. In 1978, on their first dive at the site, they found these chariot remains. Like Noah's Ark, these were not in perfect condition and required careful examination to see exactly what they were. They were covered in coral, which made it difficult to see them clearly, but it appears that the coral was the agent the Lord used to preserve them.

They found numerous wheels- some were still on their axles, and some were off. They found chariot cabs without the wheels, also: EXO 14:24 ...in the morning watch the LORD looked unto the host of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and of the cloud, and troubled the host of the Egyptians, 25 And took off their chariot wheels, that they drave them heavily:...

MOSES WAS HIGH ON HALLUCINOGENIC DRUG WHEN HE RECEIVED TEN COMMANDMENTS, CLAIMS TOP ACADEMIC

ATTAQUE CONTRE LE JUDAÏSME ET CONTRE MOÏSE.

Last updated at 00:20am on 5th March 2008

When Moses received the Ten Commandments from God, he was summoned right to the top of Mount Sinai.

But the man who led the Children of Israel to safety may have been even higher at the time, if an Israeli academic is to be believed.

Psychology professor Benny Shanon says it was likely Moses was hallucinating under the influence of a mind-altering drug at the time of his biblical achievements.

To back up his theory, Professor Shanon says the acacia tree, frequently mentioned in the Bible, contains one of the most psychedelic substances known to man.

The professor, who came up with his theory after experiencing firsthand the effects of a hallucinogenic brew used in religious rituals in Brazil, said the story of Moses and the burning bush also had the hallmarks of a psychedelic experience.

The account in the Book of Exodus of the bush's ability to burn without being "consumed" is generally attributed to the presence and power of God.

But to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem's Professor Shanon, who freely admits to having experimented with mind-bending substance "about 160 times in various locales in contexts", it is evidence of the power of drugs.

Writing in the journal Time And Mind, the professor said the telltale signs of drug-induced visions included a loss of sense of time, seeing bright lights or fire, the blurring of the senses and profound religious and spiritual feelings.

"I propose that this event involved no change in the real world, having nothing to do with either the bush or the fire," he said.

"Rather, it is reflected in the radical alteration in the state of consciousness of the beholder - that is, Moses.

"Moses's sense of time changed and an actual moment in physical time was subjectively perceived as an eternity...enough time for the bush in front of him to be burnt and consumed.

"But in the external physical domain, only a fraction of a second had elapsed, hence no actual change in the bush was perceived."

According to the professor, Moses was not alone in dabbling with drugs, with the assembled Children of Israel likely to have been in "an altered state of awareness" when Moses brought the Ten Commandments down from Mount Sinai.

Professor Shanon told Israeli radio: "As far as Moses on Mount Sinai is concerned, it was either a supernatural cosmic event, which I don't believe, or a legend, which I don't believe either, or finally, and probable, an event that joined Moses and the people of Israel under the effect of narcotics."

Even a descrïption of Moses with "shining skin" is seen as a reference to the euphoric, sweat-inducing effects associated with drug use.

He concludes: "Admittedly, the smoking gun is not available to us. However, so many clues present themselves, which, like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, seem to cohere into a intriguing, unified whole.

I could spend an untold amount of time telling you all the amazing things this city will include, like a resort, a 200-hectare desert preserve, a new international airport, a new railway, and a bridge linking it to Kuwait City.

Instead, I’ll just send you to the official website, and move on to an even bigger project.

Yes, bigger…

Saudi Arabia is in the midst of constructing a city costing nearly more than these three huge projects (Downtown Burj Dubai, Masdar City and Silk City).

King Abdullah Economic City will cost more than $120 billion. That’s 16% more than Kuwait’s entire GDP.

It will be home to 2 million people in six distinct cities within 168 million square meters of prime coastal land.

A 14 million square-meter port on the Red Sea will make this mega-city a hub for trade with Europe, Africa and Asia. A central business district promises to be a new financial capital of the world. Sea resorts will offer some of the best tourist destinations in the Middle East.

The Industrial, Residential and Education zones are expected to be second to none.

I don’t mean to sound like a cheerleader. I just can’t help but stand in awe of these countries that are able to pump hundreds of billions of dollars into these massive “pleasure projects.”

For example, the United Arab Emirates is putting $60 billion into Dubailand, an entertainment district that will cover 3 billion square feet and include some of the largest, most expensive attractions ever built.

How big is a 3-billion-square-foot amusement park exactly? First, take every single Disney-owned theme park and resort in the world. Then imagine them all in one place. Then double that.

Middle Eastern countries are literally creating Empires in the Desert, building them on a scale never before seen or even imagined. Their only limits are the depths of their pockets. And right now, those pockets seem to have no bottom at all.

"In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at twilight is the LORD'S Passover. `Then on the fifteenth day of the same month there is the Feast of Unleavened Bread to the LORD; for seven days you shall eat unleavened bread." Leviticus 23:5-6

Over 3,000 years ago, God brought the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt. He accomplished this by bringing ten devastating plagues upon the Egyptians, the last and greatest of which was the death of the oldest son in each family. God made a way for the Israelites to escape this death by sacrificing a lamb and putting its blood on the doorposts of their houses. Then the angel would “pass over” the house with the blood so that the firstborn would not die. At that time, God commanded the Israelites to celebrate the Passover every year. Each family would choose a lamb on the 10th day of the month of Nisan and on the 14th day, the lamb would be slain.

Shortly after the time of Christ, the Jewish temple in Jerusalem was destroyed. Since then, the Jewish people have not been able to follow the command to kill a lamb on Passover. But this year, a group of Jewish people carried out a ritual slaughter in Jerusalem not far from where the temple used to be.

Watching this sacrifice shows how, as God said, “the life is in the blood.” This sacrifice brings home the high cost of sin which requires the death of a substitute in the place of man.

Just before the animal is slain, the priest pronounced a blessing: "Blessed are you, LORD our God, King of the world, who has sanctified us with his statutes and commanded us concerning the [ritual] slaughtering."

BAGHDAD - Forget rocket attacks, concrete blast walls and no sewer system and try picturing luxury hotels, a shopping center and even condos in the heart of Baghdad.

It’s all part of an ambitious five-year development “dream list” to transform the U.S.-protected Green Zone from a walled fortress into a gleaming centerpiece for Baghdad’s future.

The $5 billion plan has Pentagon backing and apparently the interest of leading hotel developers, said Navy Capt. Thomas Karnowski, who led the team that created the development plan.

Washington wants to create a “zone of influence” around the new $700 million U.S. Embassy to serve as a high-end buffer for the compound, whose total price tag will reach about $1 billion after all the workers and offices are relocated over the next year.

“When you have $1 billion hanging out there and 1,000 employees lying around, you kind of want to know who your neighbors are. You want to influence what happens in your neighborhood over time,” said Karnowski.

Karnowski said a deal was already completed for Marriott International Inc. to build a hotel in the Green Zone.

He also said a possible $1 billion investment could come from MBI International, a conglomerate that

A new best-selling book on the hidden mysteries of the Jerusalem Temple Mount claims to have discovered the resting place of the lost Ark of the Covenant – the biblical refuge of the Ten Commandments handed down to Moses at Sinai.

In "Temple at the Center of Time: Newton's Bible Codex Deciphered and the Year 2012 http://shop.wnd.com/store/item.asp?DEPARTMENT_ID=6&SUBDEPARTMENT_ID=22&… ," by David Flynn, a book that has skyrocketed up the best-seller charts before its official release later this month, says his studies of the Temple Mount strongly suggest the Ark will be found at Mount Nebo in Jordan.

The discovery would be the greatest archeological find ever – as has been suggested in popular movies such as "Raiders of the Lost Ark."

In "Temple at the Center of Time," Flynn makes the case that the Temple Mount, the home of the Jewish temples, was not just a place of religious worship. It is also is a roadmap to future events – a kind of prophetic landmark whose significance is only now revealed through the development of satellite imagery.

The book asserts it has "deciphered Isaac Newton’s greatest paradox: None other than 'the unified field theory' of Bible prophecy."

Sir Isaac Newton was not only a great thinker in physics, the book explains, but had extensive knowledge of the scrïptures with a special interest in prophecy. Newton believed there was a hidden code, a type of time-encrypted language. He believed the key to deciphering this code was the Temple of Solomon. He wrote extensively on the length measurements of the Temple and suggested it intersected time and dimension, serving as a prophetic and supernatural structure.

According to Flynn, although Newton never cracked this code, he was on the right track and was limited only by the lack of sophisticated satellite technology.

"The descrïption of Jerusalem as a terrestrial center point, situated in the center of the world, is found in Philo's Legatio and Gaium," Flynn notes. "The world is like a human eyeball. The white of the eye is the ocean surrounding the world, the iris is this continent, the pupil is Jerusalem, and the image in the pupil is the Holy Temple."

Many historians speculate that because Babylon destroyed the Temple of Solomon, it also removed the Ark to Babylon. There it is said the Ark was eventually destroyed along with the other artifacts from the temple, the gold melted down and set into coins for their treasury. But the Book of Daniel makes specific mention of the golden menorah from the temple of Jerusalem in the palace of Belshazzar. The Babylonian king had preserved it, a major artifact from the Jewish temple, in an attempt to demonstrate the superiority of Babylon's gods to the God of the Hebrews. That the menorah was set on display in this manner underscores how unlikely the Babylonians would have been to destroy the Ark, the greatest symbol of the God of the Hebrews.

Certain tracts of the Midot in the Jewish Talmud dealing with temple laws, practices and rituals allude to the creation of more than one Ark, the second made as a decoy to protect the original. They claim that certain articles of the temple furnishing including the true Ark remain in a secret vault underneath the temple mount in Jerusalem.

However, others discount the likelihood of the Ark being left to fate under the Temple Mount, open to any treasure hunter with the motivation to merely dig. It is difficult to explain how the location could remain secret, as Jerusalem remained open for excavation and plundering for hundreds of years after its fall to the Romans in AD 70. Motivated treasure seekers over the ensuing centuries have had ample time to excavate the area underneath the temple.

The recovery of temple treasure of Solomon was the highest goal of the Knights Templar that established their center on the Temple Mount during the crusades.

Various Judaic sects of Ethiopia believe the Ark has been guarded and kept in the city of Axum in their country for thousands of years. The legend claims it was brought to Axum by the son of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, Prince Menelik I.

Some historians believe the Egyptians took the ark and hid it underground in the city of Tanis, the seat of Shishak’s dynasty. The location was lost over the course of history. That was the theory behind the first "Indiana Jones" movie.

But all of these theories are discounted by Flynn, who points out the Ark was a central focus of worship during the reign of King Josiah – long after the reign of Solomon.

Meanwhile, the book of 2 Maccabees 2:4 explains that before the destruction of Solomon’s temple by the Babylonians in 587 BC, the Ark was hidden by the prophet Jeremiah in a cave at the base of Mount Nebo in the Pisgah range of Jordan. Maccabees, as well as other Apocryphal works, are retained in modern Catholic bibles as well as the Septuagint and Vulgate.

The account of the Ark from 2 Maccabees is also mentioned in the Jewish Talmud, in Huriot 12A and Tractate Yoma 72a. These texts explain that the Ark's location would not be recovered until the Jews were brought back to Israel following the Diaspora, an event that occurred in 1948. The pseudopigraphic book 2 Baruch, written near the 1st century, repeats the prophetic age in which the Ark would be recovered: "Oh earth ... guard them [the temple vessels and the Ark] until the last times, So that, when thou art ordered, thou mayst restore them, So that strangers may not get possession of them. For the time comes when Jerusalem also will be delivered for a time, until it is said, that it is again restored for ever."

The legendary accounts of Jeremiah and the Ark provide a hidden clue to its location at Mount Nebo. This is a symbolic link that exists between the names of the Babylonian king that threatened to destroy the Ark, and the mountain where it was hidden by Jeremiah. Both Nebuchadnezzar and Nebo stem from the Semitic root nebu, meaning the god Mercury. This was also intimated in the prophecies of Ezekiel condemning Jerusalem. The name Nebuchadnezzar means "the prince of the god Mercury." The Hebrew word nebo is from the root neba ("to prophesy" and also "a prophet"), writes Flynn. In the same role as the prophets of the God of Israel, Nebo was worshiped as the celestial scribe of the Assyrians, the "interpreter of the gods, and declarer of their will."

According to the Bible, the greatest prophet of all time was Moses, which states, "And there arose not a prophet (neba) since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the LORD knew face to face." Ironically, according to the Bible, Mount Nebo was the site of the death of Moses.

The Hebrew words nobe, meaning "high place," and nahab, meaning "to hollow out," "gate," or "pupil of the eye," also correlate with the location for the resting place of the ark in a "hollow cave" on Mount Nebo, described in 2 Maccabees, says Flynn.

Mount Nebo is 25.20 nautical miles due East of Jerusalem – and Flynn finds significance in that distance related to his study of the Temple Mount and its mystical placement "at the center of time and space."

Before it is even officially released, "Temple at the Center of Time" is causing a sensation in some circles where it is being compared to "The Bible Code."

Hamas promises it will treat Jews with the same dignity and respect Muslims have always shown if given a chance in the future to impose its brand of Islamic rule over all the lands west of the Jordan River.

In an interview with IslamOnline, senior Hamas leader Mousa Abu Marzouk said in response to a question submitted by an Israeli that after seizing control of "Palestine" Hamas will deal with Jews "in accordance with our ethics, religious teachings, and historical values."

To clarify, Marzouk pointed to previous centuries during which all Middle East Jews supposedly lived in peace and prosperity alongside their Muslim neighbors.

"We do not have a problem when it comes to dealing with the other. We understand and recognize other people's rights, which are part of our belief system and ethics," he said.

Marzouk left out that Islam demands non-Muslims living under Muslim rule must pay an infidel tax and cannot practice their own religions in public.

The Hamas Charter provides a more realistic view of how Jews would fare under Hamas rule. In the charter, Jews are blamed for every global conflict since the French Revolution.

The Hamas Charter also quotes a well-known Koranic verse that points to an apocalyptic time during which even the trees and the stones will aid Muslims in finding and murdering Jews.

Hamas has long held up the venomous czarist anti-Semitic blood libel "The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion" as evidence that the Jewish race is inherently greedy, conniving and desirous of global domination at any cost.

Those beliefs stand behind regular mosque sermons that demonize the Jews as a bloodthirsty race that went so far as the perpetrate the Holocaust on its own people.

Most recently, a popular Hamas children's television program called "Tomorrow's Pioneers" taught young Palestinian viewers that Jews, not just Israelis, are the scourge of the earth, the enemies of Allah and the murderers of their favorite fuzzy fictional characters.

Remains of the southern wall of Jerusalem that was built by the Hasmonean Kings during the Second Temple period have been uncovered on Mount Zion, the Israel Antiquities Authority announced Wednesday. The 2,100-year-old wall, which was destroyed during the Great Revolt against the Romans that began in 66 CE, is located on Mount Zion just outside the present-day walls of the Old City of Jerusalem and abuts a Catholic cemetery which was built in the last century and where the Righteous Gentile, Oskar Schindler, is buried. The sturdy wall, which is believed to have run 6 km around the Old City, was previously exposed by an American archeologist at the end of the 19th century, the state run archeological body said. The Israeli archeologist who carried out the year and half long ongoing excavation also uncovered the remains of a city wall from the Byzantine Period (324-640 CE) which was built on top of the Second Temple wall hundreds of years later at a time when ancient Jerusalem reached its largest size after its southward expansion. The Second Temple Period wall, which was built without mortar, is "amazingly" well-preserved today to the height of three meters, more than two thousand years after it was originally constructed, the excavation director, Yehiel Zelinger said. He voiced the hope that the First Temple wall will be uncovered next.

(Extracted from JPost, 9/3/08)

mariaAdministrateur Messages postés : 14597

Posté le 22/10/2008 07:54:03 (22/10/2008 16:54:03)

CHRISTIAN LEADER URGES ISLAMIC CONTROL OF TEMPLE MOUNT CLAIMS HIS COMMUNITY 'BELONGS TO THE PALESTINIAN NATIONAL CAUSE'

JERUSALEM – A top Christian Palestinian leader here yesterday urged Islamic control of the Temple Mount while claiming Israel was threatening the site's famous Al Aqsa Mosque.

"Regarding threats against the Al Aqsa Mosque from fanatic Jews, what is threatening you is threatening Christians. One who is attacking you is attacking Christians. We are one family and one people, and we belong to the Palestinian national cause," said Attallah Hanna, archbishop of Sebastia from the Greek Orthodox Church of Jerusalem.

Jerusalem's Greek Orthodox Church is regarded by Orthodox Christians as one of the most important churches in Christendom. It has 100,000 Christians followers in the Holy Land and is also one of the largest landowners in Israel.

Hanna was speaking to Islamic leaders yesterday gathered at the Al Aqsa Mosque.

He went on to urge the Waqf, the Mount's Muslim custodians, to "keep fighting and protect Jerusalem." He thanked them for maintaining the Mount as a sacred Islamic site.

His claim of Jewish threats to the mosque are not grounded in reality. Islamic leaders routinely use non-existent Jewish threats to the Temple Mount to incite followers against Israel.

Hanna himself is closely aligned with the Palestinian cause. He was previously dismissed from his church position after Israel accused him of directly aiding terror organizations. He has held public solidarity meetings with leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah and appears regularly on Palestinian television urging children to engage in suicide attacks.

Holiest site

The Temple Mount is the holiest site in Judaism. The First Jewish Temple was built there by King Solomon in the 10th century B.C. It was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 B.C. The Second Temple was rebuilt in 515 B.C. after Jerusalem was freed from Babylonian captivity. That temple was destroyed by the Roman Empire in A.D. 70. Each temple stood for a period of about four centuries.

The Jewish Temple was the center of religious Jewish worship. It housed the Holy of Holies, which contained the Ark of the Covenant and was said to be the area upon which God's shechina or "presence" dwelt. All Jewish holidays centered on worship at the Temple. The Jewish Temple served as the primary location for the offering of sacrifices and was the main gathering place for the Jewish people.

According to the Talmud, the world was created from the foundation stone of the Temple Mount. The site is believed to be the biblical Mount Moriah, the location where Abraham fulfilled God's test to see if he would be willing to sacrifice his son Isaac.

Jewish tradition holds Mashiach, or the Jewish Messiah, will return and rebuild the third and final Temple on the Mount in Jerusalem.

The Kotel, or Western Wall, is the one part of the Temple Mount that survived the destruction of the Second Temple by the Romans and stands today in Jerusalem.

Throughout all notorious Jewish exiles, thorough documentation shows the Jews never gave up their hope of returning to Jerusalem and re-establishing their Temple. To this day, Jews worldwide pray facing the Western Wall, while Muslims turn their backs away from the Temple Mount and pray toward Mecca.

The Al Aqsa Mosque was constructed around A.D. 709 to serve as a shrine near another shrine, the Dome of the Rock, which was built by an Islamic caliph.

About 100 years ago, the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem became associated with the place Muslims came to believe Muhammad ascended to heaven. Jerusalem, however, is not mentioned in the Quran.

Islamic tradition states Muhammad took a journey in a single night from "a sacred mosque" – believed to be in Mecca in southern Saudi Arabia – to "the farthest mosque," and from a rock there ascended to heaven to receive revelations from Allah that became part of the Quran.

Palestinians today claim exclusivity over the Temple Mount, and Palestinian leaders routinely deny Jewish historic connection to the site, but historically, Muslims did not claim the Al Aqsa Mosque as their third holiest site and admitted the Jewish Temples existed.

According to research by Israeli author Shmuel Berkovits, Islam previously disregarded Jerusalem. He points out in his book "How Dreadful Is this Place!" that Muhammad was said to loathe Jerusalem and what it stood for. Berkovits wrote that Muhammad made a point of eliminating pagan sites of worship and sanctifying only one place – the Kaaba in Mecca – to signify the unity of God.

As late as the 14th century, Islamic scholar Taqi al-Din Ibn Taymiyya, whose writings influenced the Wahhabi movement in Arabia, ruled that sacred Islamic sites are to be found only in the Arabian Peninsula and that "in Jerusalem, there is not a place one calls sacred, and the same holds true for the tombs of Hebron."

It wasn't until the late 19th century – incidentally when Jews started immigrating to Palestine – that some Muslim scholars began claiming Muhammad tied his horse to the Western Wall and associated Muhammad's purported night journey with the Temple Mount. A,pa.A guide to the Temple Mount by the Supreme Muslim Council in Jerusalem published in 1925 listed the Mount as the site of Solomon's Temple. The Temple Institute acquired a copy of the official 1925 "Guide Book to Al-Haram Al-Sharif," which states on page 4, "Its identity with the site of Solomon's Temple is beyond dispute. This, too, is the spot, according to universal belief, on which 'David built there an altar unto the Lord.'"

Archeologist finds 3,000-year old Hebrew text Story HighlightsShard -- or ostracon -- found during excavations of a 10th century BC fortress

Elah Fortress in Khirbet Qeiyafa is about 20 miles southwest of Jerusalem

Researchers say the text was clearly written by a trained scribe

Carbon dating and pottery analysis dates inscrïption to time of King David

JERUSALEM (CNN) -- An Israeli archaeologist has discovered what he says is the earliest-known Hebrew text, found on a shard of pottery that dates to the time of King David from the Old Testament, about 3,000 years ago.

The shard -- or ostracon -- contains five lines of text divided by black lines.

1 of 2 Professor Yosef Garfinkel of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem says the inscribed pottery shard -- known as an ostracon -- was found during excavations of a fortress from the 10th century BC.

Carbon dating of the ostracon, along with pottery analysis, dates the inscrïption to time of King David, about a millennium earlier than the famous Dead Sea Scrolls, the university said.

The shard contains five lines of text divided by black lines and measures 15 by 15 centimeters, or about 6 inches square.

Archaeologists have yet to decipher the text, but initial interpretation indicates it formed part of a letter and contains the roots of the words "judge," "slave," and "king," according to the university. That may indicate it was a legal text, which archaeologists say would provide insights into Hebrew law, society, and beliefs.

The researchers say the text was clearly written by a trained scribe.

The shard was discovered at the Elah Fortress in Khirbet Qeiyafa, about 20 miles southwest of Jerusalem. The fortress, measuring 2.3 hectares (about 5.7 acres), is the earliest-known fortified city of the biblical period in Israel.

Excavations began there in June. So far, just four percent of the site has been excavated, the university said.

Because the ostracon is similar to that found in other Israelite settlements, and because no pig bones were found at the site, archaeologists say the site was likely part of the Kingdom of Judea. Jewish dietary laws forbid the eating of pork.

Among the artifacts found at the site are more than 100 jar handles bearing distinct impressions which may indicate a link to royal vessels, the university said. Such a large quantity found in such a small area is "unprecedented," the university said.

The site of Khirbet Qeiyafa is located near the place where the Bible describes the battle between David and Goliath -- the Elah Valley, which shares its name with the fortress.

Garfinkel said it is the only site in Israel in which to investigate King David.

"The chronology and geography of Khirbet Qeiyafa create a unique meeting point between the mythology, history, historiography and archaeology of King David," he said.

The Dead Sea Scrolls are the earliest-known copies of the Bible, some dating back about 2,000 years.

It is widely believed that the first set of Dead Sea Scrolls was discovered in 1947 by a Bedouin shepherd who ventured into a cave in the Judean Desert in search of a lost sheep or goat.

The texts, written on crumbling parchment and papyrus, were found wrapped in linen inside earthenware jars.

Jan. 5: U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte, right, and Iraqi President Jalal Talabani look on during a ceremony marking the opening of the new U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.

After much delay the United States opened its new $700 million embassy in Iraq on Monday, inaugurating the largest — and most expensive — embassy ever built.

The 104-acre compound, bigger than the Vatican and about the size of 80 football fields, boasts 21 buildings, a commissary, cinema, retail and shopping areas, restaurants, schools, a fire station, power and water treatment plants, as well as telecommunications and wastewater treatment facilities.

The compound is six times larger than the United Nations compound in New York, and two-thirds the size of the National Mall in Washington.

It has space for 1,000 employees with six apartment blocks and is 10 times larger than any other U.S. embassy.

In a ceremony Monday attended by U.S. and Iraqi officials, the U.S. Ambassador Ryan Cocker ushered in a "new era" for both Iraq and for the Iraqi-U.S. relationship, although critics have said that the embassy's fortress-like design and immense size show a fundamental disconnect between the U.S. and conditions on the ground in Iraq.

“The presence of a massive U.S. embassy — by far the largest in the world — co-located in the Green Zone with the Iraqi government is seen by Iraqis as an indication of who actually exercises power in their country,” the International Crisis Group, a European-based research group, said in 2006.

"The idea of an embassy this huge, this costly, and this isolated from events taking place outside its walls is not necessarily a cause for celebration," architectural historian Jane Loeffler wrote in Foreign Affairs in 2007.

"Traditionally, at least, embassies were designed to further interaction with the community in which they were built," she wrote. “Although the U.S. Government regularly proclaims confidence in Iraq’s democratic future, the U.S. has designed an embassy that conveys no confidence in Iraqis and little hope for their future. Instead, the U.S. has built a fortress capable of sustaining a massive, long-term presence in the face of continued violence.”

The inauguration of the $700 million embassy compound in the heart of the Green Zone came just days after a security agreement between Iraq and the United States took effect, replacing a U.N. mandate that gave legal authority to the U.S. and other foreign troops to operate in Iraq.

"I think we have seen a tremendous amount of progress, even since September. But the development of this new Iraq is going to be a very long time in the making, and we need to be engaged here," Crocker said.

Crocker's remarks were an indirect appeal for the U.S. to stay engaged diplomatically and politically in Iraq, regardless of the eventual withdrawal of the approximately 146,000 troops stationed here. The veteran diplomat has served before in the Middle East, where a lack of U.S. resolve in places like Lebanon 20 years ago opened that country to meddling from Iran and Syria.

U.S. diplomats and military officials moved into the embassy on Dec. 31 after spending almost six years housed in Saddam Hussein's Republican Palace, which they occupied when they captured Baghdad in April 2003.

The grandiose and gaudy palace, with its gold-plated bathroom fixtures, wall paintings of Scud missiles and enormous chandeliers, served as both headquarters for occupying forces and the hub for the Green Zone — the walled-off swath of central Baghdad that was formally turned over to the Iraqi government on New Year's Day.

The palace will now seat the Iraqi government and the office of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who did not attend the Monday's ceremony because he was traveling in Iran.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani praised President George W. Bush and the new embassy.

"The building of this site would not be possible without the courageous decision by President Bush to liberate Iraq," said Talabani. "This building is not only a compound for the embassy but a symbol of the deep friendship between the two peoples of Iraq and America."

The First Built as Big as Noah's, It Joins a Global Regatta of Replicas

APRIL 14, 2009 By JONATHAN CHENG

HONG KONG -- This city's three billionaire Kwok brothers have just the answer for the rising waters threatening the global economy: the world's first life-size replica of Noah's ark, built to biblical specifications off the coast of this recession-struck Chinese financial center.

The message in its 450-foot-long hull, its rooftop luxury hotel and 67 pairs of fiberglass animals: "The financial tsunami will be over," says Spencer Lu, the Kwoks' project director at Noah's Ark, which is opening soon.

The land-bound ark wasn't built in response to the current global turmoil; it has been in the planning for 17 years. But the financial storm provides a nice marketing hook for the Kwoks' ambitious project, which will probably need to lure visitors from beyond Hong Kong's city limits to be an economic success.

Latter-Day Noahs Build Arks

GreenpeaceIt also ups the ante in the competition to build a big ark. Middle brother and ark champion Thomas Kwok insisted that it be constructed according to biblical specs, in part to distinguish it from one in the Netherlands that actually floats and boasts real farm animals but is just one-fifth the size of the biblical original.

Minders of the Dutch ark say they were in touch with the Hong Kong team and don't see it as competition. "We stand for the same goal as far as I can tell," said Jacky Baken, a 35-year-old gardener who quit her business to work full time on the ark. She says the group is at work on a full-size water-going version. And, she says, "We're still the first one with the floating ark."

These are just the latest additions to a veritable ark armada built around the world by the devout and the merely driven -- from a 300-foot-long ark built by a pastor in the Canadian town of Florenceville, New Brunswick, to one built by Greenpeace in 2007 on Turkey's Mount Ararat, warning of "impending climate disaster."

Richard Greene, a 72-year-old evangelical minister, began building his full-size ark, in Frostburg, Md., after a vision he says came to him in 1974. Mr. Greene ran out of funds in the 1990s, leaving a giant skeleton of concrete and steel, but he says that 35 years on, he hasn't lost hope, though he can't help but be in awe of the other ark-builders. "If I got jealous of what other people are doing, this whole thing would have sunk years ago," he says. "You just keep on keeping on...But if God doesn't move a lot quicker, I won't be around to see the completion of this ark."

Some latter-day Noahs believe the biblical story of a flood washing away man's misdeeds resonates in a time of sunken financial institutions and economic tumult. "Things aren't going so well, and God, even in the midst of all that trouble, has provided an ark of safety, a place where people can turn into and go," says Nathan Smith, a pastor at the nondenominational Florenceville church.

A Dutch Ark

"People are scared and they don't know where they're going," says Johan Huibers, the 50-year-old builder of the Dutch ark, who hopes to be able to sail the boat to London in time for the 2012 Olympics, and then on to the U.S. and Australia.

The instructions in the King James version of the Bible call for a gopher wood and pitch vessel that is 300 cubits long, 50 wide and 30 high, with a window, a door and three stories. (By the reckoning of modern scholars, that comes out to about 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high.)

But the instructions aren't specific beyond that, and the engineering isn't easy. The Dutch version is made up of iron barges under the wood, while the Hong Kong ark is made of concrete reinforced with glass fiber.

Hong Kong's ark builders also tried to install a permanent rainbow through light refraction but eventually gave up when the science proved too difficult. The Dutch team is also wrestling with the challenge of installing a convincing rainbow.

The Kwok brothers, backers of the Hong Kong ark, are heirs to their father's blue-chip Sun Hung Kai Properties Ltd., which at the height of the real-estate boom was the world's largest property developer by market capitalization. But the brothers squabbled in recent years, and last year the board voted to oust eldest brother Walter Kwok as chairman and installed their 80-year-old mother to succeed him.

The Noah's Ark project reflects Thomas Kwok's evangelical Christian faith. During the 1990s, he set up a church on the 75th-floor pyramid atrium atop Sun Hung Kai's Central Plaza office complex. The Noah's Ark project was initially hatched as a theme park with rides, until Mr. Kwok decided the project should be something more than that. It was held up in planning for several years, and construction on the ark's foundations didn't begin in earnest until 2004.

The Kwoks' version of the ark, which sits on 270,000 square feet of space and was developed in conjunction with five Christian organizations, houses a restaurant, exhibition hall and children's museum in addition to the Noah's Resort hotel. Mr. Kwok won't disclose the cost of the project, which is beached on a small island in Hong Kong's harbor most reachable via ferry, at the foot of a busy bridge that connects the city to its airport.

Sun Hung Kai Properties

Hong Kong's ark, built to biblical specificationsMr. Lu says his team has yet to come up with a strategy for promoting it to mainland Chinese, many of whom aren't familiar with the tale. The company is touting the project as a family-friendly vacation spot, and is framing it as an answer to the economic woes felt around the globe.

"People are experiencing a crisis right now," says Mr. Lu, waving his hand over fiberglass statues of a pair of bears overlooking the South China Sea. "It's possible that this financial tsunami has come at this time to Hong Kong for a reason. And our message is: The doors of the ark are not closed, they're open, and the animals -- representing new life -- are coming out."

The project has also come under fire from some groups that say the government shouldn't have granted Mr. Kwok a 21-year lease on the island to build an explicitly religious project, without the approval of the legislature. Mr. Lu says the park isn't promoting religion. "We're promoting meaning," he says.

Frances Leung, a 57-year-old social worker who has seen a big chunk of her savings evaporate in the markets, was invited to visit the ark before its official opening. She says she drew great inspiration from seeing the animals, and new hope.

"When you go to Disneyland, there's really no message there," says Ms. Leung. "But at Noah's Ark, there is such a strong message that life goes on."

Call it a “Green Zone” for Pakistan and Afghanistan. The United States will spend more than a $1 billion on a brand spanking new embassy in Islamabad, along with permanent housing for U.S. government civilians and new office space in the Pakistani capital, according to McClatchy. It is said scale of the project rivals the giant U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, which was completed last year after construction delays at a cost of $740 million.

An architect’s view of a “village” located inside the sprawling U.S. embassy in Baghdad built by slaves.

The Baghdad embassy was built by slaves. The State Department awarded contracts to First Kuwaiti General Trading & Contracting, a construction firm run by a member of one of the most powerful mercantile families in Kuwait, and the company hired low-paid Asian laborers that lived in crowded quarters, ate substandard food and had little medical care, according to David Phinney, writing for AlterNet. “When drinking water was scarce in the blistering heat, coolers were filled on the banks of the Tigris, a river rife with waterborne disease, sewage and sometimes floating bodies,” writes Phinney. First Kuwaiti General Trading & Contracting held the passports of the laborers so they would not be able to escape. Dozens of migrant workers from Nepal and the Philippines have previously accused First Kuwaiti of pressuring them to work in Iraq under U.S. military contracts against their wishes.

First Kuwaiti General Trading & Contracting came in seriously behind schedule and over budget on the project. It was plagued by allegations of shoddy construction and safety flaws, McClatchy reported in 2007. None of this was a problem with the United States because the slave-driving shyster company was hired as a subcontractor to build embassies and consulates in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, Libreville, Gabon, and Surabaya, Indonesia.

Slaves or near-slaves are employed at the Baghdad fortress-like embassy to tend landscaping and take out the trash. No Iraqis need apply. “Iraqi citizens are not currently able to be vetted so may not work on this contract,” according to a document located by Steve Peacock. “The majority of the employees are expected to be third country nationals.”

It should come as no surprise Iraqis resent the Baghdad embassy. “The presence of a massive U.S. embassy — by far the largest in the world — co-located in the Green Zone with the Iraqi government is seen by Iraqis as an indication of who actually exercises power in their country,” the International Crisis Group, a European-based research group, said in one of its periodic reports on Iraq published in 2006.

“The message is clear. Indeed, it’s gigantic for all Iraqis, for the entire world to see. A 100 acre compound — ten times the size of the typical U.S. embassy, the size of 80 football fields, six times larger than the UN, the size of Vatican City. The U.S. Embassy Compound, in the middle of Baghdad — the center for U.S. domination of the Middle East and its resources,” writes Kevin Zeese, director of Democracy Rising and a former candidate for the U.S. Senate. “The infrastructure is being put in place for a long-term military presence in Iraq. Unless Americans get tired of footing the growing and expensive bill for occupying Iraq — now at nearly $10 Billion per month — or the Iraqis are able to force the United States to leave it, looks like Baghdad will be the center of operations for the U.S. presence in the Middle East.”

Earlier this week it was reported that the United States plans to stay in Iraq for a decade or more. “Gen George Casey said the world remained ‘dangerous and unpredictable’, and the Pentagon must plan for extended US combat and stability operations in both Iraq and Afghanistan that could deploy 50,000 US military personnel for a decade,” the Telegraph reported on May 27. “His planning envisioned combat troops in Iraq and Afghanistan for a decade as part of a sustained American commitment to fighting extremism and terrorism in the Middle East.”

Casey, of course, didn’t mention that the “extremism and terrorism” was largely created by the United States as part of an order out of chaos policy. Earlier this month, Pakistan president Asif Ali Zardari said the CIA and his country’s ISI together created the Taliban.

“We should recognize that American tax dollars helped to create the very Taliban government that now wants to destroy us,” Ron Paul noted in 2001. “In the late 1970s and early 80s, the CIA was very involved in the training and funding of various fundamentalist Islamic groups in Afghanistan, some of which later became today’s brutal Taliban government. In fact, the U.S. government admits to giving the groups at least 6 billion dollars in military aid and weaponry, a staggering sum that would be even larger in today’s dollars.”

In order to fight the Taliban and al-Qaeda — perennial enemies with shades of Orwell’s Emmanuel Goldstein, a propaganda fabrication of the Ministry of Truth — the United States will need to stay in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan for the indefinite future. The Taliban and al-Qaeda will be exploited once again in order to accomplish the real objective — the engineered destruction and ultimate balkanization of the Middle East and South and Central Asia at the behest of the New World Order.

It was Obama’s foreign policy guru, Zbigniew Brzezinski, who said the United States must dominate the region in order “to prevent collusion and maintain security dependence among the vassals, to keep tributaries pliant and protected, and to keep the barbarians from coming together.”

By now liberals and Democrats must realize Obama is merely a continuation of Bush and all his insincere anti-war talk and mumbo-jumbo about “change” was a sleight of hand, a parlor trick designed to fool them. Bush and Obama, however, are merely front men for a political order determined to conquer the world through never-ending violence.

More than a million dead Iraqis and the dismantling of Iraqi civil society will serve as a brutal modus that will now be used against Pakistan. Obama’s brand spanking new mega-embassy in Islamabad — complete with slaves and “third-party” servants — will be the center of operations for the dismantling of Pakistan.

ALBANY - Governor David Paterson Sunday announced that Riverdale Temple and Riverdale Jewish Center will each receive a $25,000 grant to upgrade their security systems. The New York State Office of Homeland Security will work with these synagogues to craft and submit a security plan to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Paterson also sent a letter to Congress, requesting an increase in homeland security funding for not-for-profits, including synagogues.

“These two congregations stand for the best of our nation’s values – tolerance, liberty and peace. All New Yorkers of every faith should feel safe in their religious sanctuaries,” said Paterson. “In New York, we must maintain a special vigilance. We know firsthand the ravages of terror and we must continue to be proactive about fighting terrorism at the state level. We also know that our State stands as a beacon to freedom-loving people everywhere and we must continue to do whatever it takes to protect our values and the New Yorkers who stand for them.”

Four men from Newburgh, NY were arrested for hatching the plot to buy explosives and blow up the two synagogues. They also bought a stinger rocket that they wanted to use to shoot down C-5A cargo jets at Stewart Airport at Newburgh. The FBI infiltrated the terrorist gang and sold them fake bombs and missiles. The men were arrested last week.

INN reports: "Patriarch Abuna Pauolos of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church has scheduled a news conference for Friday afternoon in Rome to unveil the Biblical Ark of the Covenant or make a full statement regarding it. While in Rome for meetings with Pope Benedict XVI, he told reporters that the time had come to reveal the Holy Ark before the world, adding that the holy container has been hidden in the custody of his church for hundreds of years."

HOLY ARK ANNOUNCEMENT DUE ON FRIDAY

Building said to house the Ark

by Hillel Fendel

(IsraelNN.com) An Ethiopian church leader says Friday, June 26, marks the right time to unveil the Biblical Ark of the Covenant, which he says has been hidden in his church for centuries.

Abuna Pauolos, Patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, was in Rome this week to meet with Pope Benedict XVI. While there, he told reporters that the time had come to reveal before the world the Holy Ark. He said that the holy container has been in the custody of his church for hundreds of years.

Paulous said he would make the full announcement this Friday, June 26, 2 PM local time (3 PM Israel time, 8 AM New York time) at a press conference in Rome.

The claim that the Biblical Holy Ark has been kept at the Church, in the city of Axum, is an old one, but this is the first time that the Church plans to actually reveal the actual container, or news of it. It is not known whether the Church claims that the actual Tablets of the Law are inside it.

Copies of the alleged Ark are kept in many other churches in Ethiopia.

The news of the impending announcement was first reported by the Italian news agency Adnkronos. Pauolos told the news outlet, "Soon the world will be able to admire the Ark of the Covenant described in the Bible as the container of the tablets of the law that G-d delivered to Moses, and the center of searches and studies for centuries."

Pauolos said "The Ark of the Covenant has been in Ethiopia for many centuries. As Patriarch, I have seen it with my own eyes, and only a few, highly-qualified persons could do the same - until now."

Back to Earth

Stuart Munro-Hay, author of “Quest for the Ark of the Covenant: The True History of the Tablets of Moses,” concluded that the object in question is definitely not the original Holy Ark.

The building of the Ark of the Covenant – also known as the Ark of Testimony and the Ark of G-d’s Covenant – in accordance with Divine instructions is recounted in the Book of Exodus. The Ark held the Tablets of the Law, and traveled with the People of Israel, leading the way into the Promised Land. It was placed first in the Tabernacle in Shilo, and centuries later in the Holy Temple built by King Solomon. Since then, its whereabouts have been unknown, though one popular legend says it was brought to Ethiopia. Alternatively, it could be under the Temple Mount, in a cave at Mt. Nevo in Jordan, in the Vatican, a hideaway in Utah, or elsewhere.

Story and photos by Seth Robson, Stars and StripesMideast edition, Sunday, June 28, 2009

HILLAH, Iraq — The remains of what was once the greatest city in the world occupy a vast site on the bank of the Euphrates River.

Their roots go back 3,800 years to when the city of Babylon was the heart of a Mesopotamian empire, and the remnants include great slabs of stone that are said to be the remains of King Nebuchadnezzar’s castle. A giant stone lion guards one end of the fortifications, but the most stunning remnants were removed by European archaeologists in the early 20th century.

Now soldiers with the 172nd Infantry Brigade are exploring the ruins as part of a U.S.-Iraqi effort to preserve the ancient city and plan for the return of Western tourists.

Members of the brigade’s 2nd Battalion, 28th Infantry Regiment escorted a group of U.S. heritage tourism experts to the ruins last week for the first of several visits to develop a preservation and tourism plan for the area.

U.S. and coalition troops have been criticized in the past for damaging and contaminating artifacts. In a 2006 report, the head of the British Museum’s Near East department said that, among other things, military vehicles crushed a 2,600-year-old brick pavement, and sand and archeological fragments were used to fill military sandbags.

Now the rapidly improving security situation in surrounding Babil province has persuaded the U.S. State Department and the Iraqi State Board of Antiquities and Heritage to embark on the preservation project, dubbed the Future of Babylon Project.

The State Department and the World Monuments Fund have committed $700,000 to the project, which will see U.S. and Iraqi experts develop a plan to preserve the site and develop a local tourism industry, said Diane Siebrandt, the U.S. embassy’s cultural heritage officer.

The Babylon project is one of several that the State Department is involved in to conserve ancient sites in partnership with the Iraqi government, she said.

Two people with expertise developing tourism plans for historic sites in third-world nations, Gina Haney and Jeff Allen, have been employed by the State Department to run the U.S. side of the project. They visited the ruins for the first time last weekend.

Haney said the pair will involve the local community in the plan’s development, as they did with a similar project encouraging Western tourists to visit Ghana’s Gold Coast.

“You could throw money at it and do all this work, but unless you can create a sustainable situation, your opportunities for tourism will run out,” Allen said. “The idea is to develop something that is going to be here 30 to 40 years from now and has benefits for the local people. We don’t want something that will only benefit outsiders.”

The Iraqi government will be involved in the planning as well.

“If you have 200,000 people a year coming to this site, you will have people staying at hotels, visiting restaurants, buying souvenirs,” Allen said. “The site is in some ways a revenue generator for the local community.”

Babylon could be comparable to the Egyptian pyramids, which draw millions of tourists each year. But the area lacks the tourist infrastructure that has been built at sites such as the pyramids, he said.

“There is nothing for tourists here, but if you interpret and present it in the right way, you can spark interest,” he said.

Allen, who has experience designing walkways and signs for other heritage sites, said detailed planning won’t happen until authorities have worked out how best to preserve the ruins. The crumbling rocks of the original city are surrounded by more elaborate and modern fortifications, including a maze-like collection of interior walls built on top of genuine ruins during Saddam Hussein’s time.

“Some of the past restoration work hasn’t been very good,” he said. “Saddam was trying to inherit the power of the ancients and continue that legacy. His restoration methods helped reinforce that vision of himself, and he created a pattern of restoration and repair work that benefited a certain agenda.”

One of the 172nd soldiers who visited the ruins, 1st Lt. Bryan Kelso, 24, of Jacksonville, Fla., walked in wonder near the ancient stones.

“It’s amazing to be surrounded by this history. To think that we are standing where Alexander the Great has been,” he said, referring to the great Macedonian conqueror who died in Babylon. “Babylon is one of the oldest and first civilizations known to man. They created the wheel and the first calendars. Everybody coming here gets a sense of what this place really is and how it all traces back.”

Ethiopia's Orthodox patriarch cops out on revealing plan for public viewing

The leader of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church today backed off on a much-anticipated announcement about the Ark of the Covenant -- the ancient container holding the Ten Commandment -- which he claims to have seen.

But no other evidence or, indeed, even any announcement, was made public today when word had been expected.

Ark hunters and Bible enthusiasts have been buzzing for two days on the report from the Italian news agency Adnkronos that Patriarch Abuna Pauolos, in Italy for a meeting with Pope Benedict XVI this week, said, "Soon the world will be able to admire the Ark of the Covenant described in the Bible as the container of the tablets of the law that God delivered to Moses and the center of searches and studies for centuries."

He had suggested the possibility the artifact might be viewable in a planned museum.

"I repeat (the Ark of the Covenant) is in Ethiopia and nobody … knows for how much time. Only God knows," he said in the Adnkronos report available online.

The report said Pauolos reported the artifact "is described perfectly in the Bible" and is in good condition.

"The state of conservation is good because it is not made from man's hand, but is something that God has made," Pauolos said, according to the report.

The agency had reported an announcement would be made at the Hotel Aldrovandi in Rome, and a hotel spokeswoman told WND Pauolos had been in residence there, but no news conference or event was scheduled.

"The Ark of the Covenant is in Ethiopia for many centuries," said Pauolos in the report. "As a patriarch I have seen it with my own eyes and only few highly qualified persons could do the same, until now."

Bob Cornuke, biblical investigator, international explorer and best-selling author, has participated in more than 27 expeditions around the world searching for lost locations described in the Bible. A man some consider a real-life Indiana Jones, he has written a book titled "Relic Quest" about the Ark of the Covenant and participated in History Channel production called "Digging for Truth."

Next week, Cornuke will travel to Ethiopia for the 13th time since he began his search for the Ark. He told WND he believes it is possible Ethiopia could have the real artifact.

"They either have the Ark of the Covenant or they have a replica that they have believed to be the Ark of the Covenant for 2,000 years," he said.

Cornuke said, if it is genuine, there's a plausible explanation of how the Ark may have come to the Church of Our Lady Mary of Zion in Ethiopia.

"The Ark could have been taken out of the temple during the time of the atrocities of Manasseh," he said. "We have kind of a bread crumb trail that appears to go to Egypt, and it stayed on an island there for a couple hundred years called Elephantine Island. The Ark then was transferred over to Lake Tana in Ethiopia where it stayed on Tana Qirqos Island for 800 years. Then it was taken to Axum, where it is enshrined in a temple today where they don't let anybody see it."

Cornuke said he traveled to Tana Qirqos Island and lived with monks who remain there even today.

"They unlocked this big, four-inch thick wood door," he said. "It opened up to a treasure room, and they showed me meat forks and bowls and things that they say are from Solomon's temple. When the History Channel did this show, they said it was one of the largest viewed shows. People were fascinated."

He said Ethiopians consider the Ark to be the ultimate holy object, and the church guards the suspected artifact from the "eyes and pollution of man."

"In Ethiopia, their whole culture is centered around worshipping this object," Cornuke said. "Could they have the actual Ark? I think I could make a case that they actually could."

But according to a statement delivered to WND by the webmaster for the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, there is no chance that the religious leaders and people in the nation will give up their custody of what they believe is the Ark.

"I think Abba Pauolos must be out of his mind. … An (artifact) should not be shown or touched other than the clergies but to put it on display is a reckless comment let alone doing it," the statement said. "Not only the local clergies but the people of Ethiopia won't allow it and it is not going to happen."

The webmaster noted there were artifacts moved from Ethiopia to Britain over the years, and even those are not allowed to be displayed.

Pauolos in the Adnkronos report said any display would need the approval of the supreme court of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.

A spokesman for a U.S. branch of the church, Mehereto Belete of Los Angeles, told WND he had been given no word of any major change in the status of the Ark.

"It is news for us just as it is for you," he said.

Cornuke explained that a special guardian lives inside the church which reportedly holds the Ark and never leaves. Once a guardian is appointed, he stays until he dies and another man replaces him.

"We know for a fact that there have been 30 guardians in history who have never left that enclosure," Cornuke said. "I know the guardian. When CNN and BBC went over there, he wouldn't see anybody but me. So I went and talked to him, and he's getting very aged. He told me they have the real Ark and he worships 13 hours a day in front of it. When he gets through, he is covered in sweat and he's exhausted."

He said he met a 105-year-old man who claimed to have seen the Ark 50 years ago when he was training a replacement guardian.

"It frightened him to death when he got a glimpse of it."

Cornuke said he also met with the president of Ethiopia nearly nine years ago and had a one-on-one conversation with him in his palace. He asked if Ethiopia had the Ark of the Covenant.

According to Cornuke, the president responded: "Yes, we do. I am the president, and I know. It's not a copy. It's the real thing."

However, Grant Jeffrey, host of TBN's Bible Prophecy Revealed and well-known author of "Armageddon: Appointment With Destiny," does not believe claims that the Ark is in Ethiopia. He told WND he spoke extensively with Robert Thompson, former adviser to former Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie.

Jeffrey said Thompson told him the Ark of the Covenant had been taken to Ethiopia by Menelik, purported son of the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon. When Menelik became emperor, he claims royal priests entrusted him with the Ark of the Covenant because King Solomon was slipping into apostasy. A replica was then left behind in Israel.

"The Ethiopian royal chronicles suggest that for 3,000 years, they had been guarding the ark, knowing that it had to go back to Israel eventually," Jeffrey said.

He claims that after the Ethiopian civil war, Israel sent in a group of commandos from the tribe of Levi and the carried the Ark onto a plane and back to Israel in 1991.

"It is being held there secretly, waiting in the eyes of the religious leaders of Israel, for a supernatural signal from God to rebuild the temple," he said. "They are not going to do it before that. When that happens, they will bring the Ark into that temple."

But author and Bible teacher Chuck Missler, founder of Koinonia House, told WND the theory of Menelik obtaining the Ark is not biblical, though he believes there is a possibility that the Ethiopians may have the real deal.

"The fact that the Ethiopians may have been guarding the Ark of the Bible is very possible," he said. "They cling to a belief that is clearly not biblical in terms of how the Ark got down there. But that doesn't mean they don't have it."

Missler said there is no biblical basis for the Menelik account, and he believes there was a reason for that version of events.

"What everybody overlooks is that there's a reason that particular story was cooked up in early times," he said. "It was to give their kings Solomonic descent. There's reason why they would try to sell that. But just because the official belief in how it got down there is not biblical, doesn't mean they don't have it."

Tennessee historian and "Time is the Ally of Deceit" author Richard Rives, searched for the Ark and participated in excavations beneath Mount Moriah outside the walls of ancient Jerusalem. His group was trying to verify claims by relic hunter Ron Wyatt that he actually saw the Ark there several decades ago after tunneling through a small passageway.

While they found Roman ruins from the first century, Rives told WND they were unsuccessful in confirming Wyatt's account. Nonetheless, Rives does not believe the story of Menelik obtaining the artifact or that Ethiopia ever had the real Ark.

"God's presence was on the mercy seat. That was the throne of God," he said.

If the account were accurate, Rives said God would have been dwelling on an Ark replica in Jerusalem.

"I just don't believe they could have persuaded him to sit on a fake Ark of the Covenant," he said.

Many theories exist about the ultimate fate of the Ark, including that it has been hidden in a still unknown location, it was destroyed by enemies of the Israelites, taken by Egyptian invaders to Egypt or removed by divine intervention.

The quest for the artifact received additional publicity in 1981 when actor Harrison Ford searched for it in Steven Spielberg's "Raiders of the Lost Ark."

Cornuke said Ethiopians claim their purported Ark is kept in a large stone sarcophagus lined in ornately hammered silver. The Ark itself is made of acacia wood and laminated with a thin veneer of gold. The mercy seat sits atop the Ark and is made of pure, hammered gold and includes two cherubim facing one another.

Whether the artifact is real or simply a copy, Cornuke said an unveiling might leave the world with more questions than answers.

"We have only typology to go on," he said. "We could probably have some people analyze the wood samples and come up with some kind of dating protocol on it because it is acacia wood to see if that is it."

Rives said a close inspection of the Ten Commandments would be necessary to ensure they are in accordance with true text and not later versions of the Ten Commandments.

Cornuke said experts would also need to determine whether the artifact itself fits biblical descrïption and trace its path to Ethiopia.

Diplomatic presence on the scale of Iraq prompts concerns in Pakistan about American meddling

By Saeed Shah and Warren P. Strobel | McClatchy Newspapers from the May 28, 2009 edition

Islamabad - The US is embarking on a $1 billion crash program to expand its diplomatic presence in Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan, another sign that the Obama administration is making a costly, long-term commitment to war-torn South Asia, US officials said Wednesday.

The White House has asked Congress for – and seems likely to receive – $736 million to build a new US embassy in Islamabad, along with permanent housing for US government civilians and new office space in the Pakistani capital.

The scale of the projects rivals the giant US Embassy in Baghdad, which was completed last year after construction delays at a cost of $740 million.

Senior State Department officials said the expanded diplomatic presence is needed to replace overcrowded, dilapidated and unsafe facilities and to support a "surge" of civilian officials into Afghanistan and Pakistan ordered by President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Other major projects are planned for Kabul, Afghanistan; and for the Pakistani cities of Lahore and Peshawar. In Peshawar, the US government is negotiating the purchase of a five-star hotel that would house a new US consulate.

Funds for the projects are included in a 2009 supplemental spending bill that the House of Representatives and the Senate have passed in slightly different forms.

Obama has repeatedly stated that stabilizing Pakistan and Afghanistan, the countries from which Al Qaeda and the Taliban operate, is vital to US national security. He's ordered thousands of additional troops to Afghanistan and is proposing substantially increased aid to both countries.

Macro buildings to micro manage?

In Pakistan, however, large parts of the population are hostile to the US presence in the region – despite receiving billions of dollars in aid from Washington since 2001 – and anti-American groups and politicians are likely to seize on the expanded diplomatic presence in Islamabad as evidence of American "imperial designs."

"This is a replay of Baghdad," said Khurshid Ahmad, a member of Pakistan's upper house of parliament for Jamaat-e-Islami, one of the country's two main religious political parties. "This [Islamabad embassy] is more [space] than they should need. It's for the micro and macro management of Pakistan, and using Pakistan for pushing the American agenda in Central Asia."

In Baghdad and other dangerous locales, US diplomats have sometimes found themselves cut off from the population in heavily fortified compounds surrounded by blast walls, concertina wire, and armed guards.

"If you're going to have people live in a car bomb-prone place, you are driven to not have a light footprint," said Ronald Neumann, a former US ambassador to Afghanistan and the president of the American Academy of Diplomacy. Mr. Neumann called the planned expansions "generally pretty justified."

In Islamabad, according to State Department budget documents, the plan calls for the rapid construction of a $111 million new office annex to accommodate 330 workers; $197 million to build 156 permanent and 80 temporary housing units; and a $405 million replacement of the main embassy building. The existing embassy, in the capital's leafy diplomatic enclave, was badly damaged in a 1979 assault by Pakistani students.

The US government also plans to revamp its consular buildings in the eastern city of Lahore and in Peshawar, the regional capital of the militancy plagued North West Frontier Province. The consulate in the southern megacity of Karachi has just been relocated into a new purpose-built accommodation.

Buying the Pearl in Peshawar

A senior State Department official confirmed that the US plan for the consulate in Peshawar involves the purchase of the luxury Pearl Continental hotel. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly.

The Pearl Contintental is the city's only five-star hotel, set in its own expansive grounds, with a swimming pool. It's owned by Pakistani tycoon Sadruddin Hashwani.

Peshawar is an important station for gathering intelligence on the tribal area that surrounds the city on three sides and is a base for Al Qaeda and the Taliban. The area also will be a focus for expanded US aid programs, and the American mission in Peshawar has already expanded from three US diplomats to several dozen.

In all, the administration requested $806 million for diplomatic construction and security in Pakistan.

"For the strong commitment the US is making in the country of Pakistan, we need the necessary platform to fulfill our diplomatic mission," said Jonathan Blyth of the State Department's Overseas Buildings Operations bureau. "The embassy is in need of upgrading and expansion to meet our future mission requirements."

A senior Pakistani official said the expansion has been under discussion for three years. "Pakistanis understand the need for having diplomatic missions expanding and the Americans always have had an enclave in Islamabad," said the official, who requested anonymity, because he wasn't authorized to discuss the matter publicly. "Will some people exploit it? They will."

In Kabul, the US government is negotiating an $87 million purchase of a 30- to 40-acre parcel of land to expand the embassy. The Senate version of the appropriations bill omits all but $10 million of those funds.

(IsraelNN.com) A new state-of-the-art radar system at Ben-Gurion International Airport has replaced the former 12-year-old system. The new system is a backup to the main radar system and turns on automatically in case the main system fails.

The $9 million system is expected to meet the high standards of the U.S. Federal Aviation Agency.

Okay. This took me ALL night to find in the Bible to type to you folks :

The Bible predicts Israels reformation, this is widely known.. it was actually predicted twice. read Isaiah 11:11.. not typing it all out

But did you know it was predicted to the PRECISE year!? I'll show ya..

1st time Israel was conquered by Babylon. They were freed again after 70 years as predicted by Jeremiah.. a Prophet.

Jeremiah 25:11 "and this whole land shall be a desolation and astonishment. and these nation shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. "

Now.. Both biblical and secular history show Babylon captured Israel in the spring of 606 bc and the capitivy ended exactly 70 years later in the spring of 536bc

Now. read, go find, Ezekiel 4:5 and 4:6

It says, 430 years was the amount of years the Jewish people would be put into exile for their iniquity and sins.... but before hand they were captive under babylon for 70 years. so, this leaves 360. then in Leviticus 26:18 its stated the Lord will punish their sins 7 times over. 360 x 7= 2520

so because they didn't repent.. it was timed by 7 and that 2520 was the amount of years the Jews would be without a nation.

now the Hebrew calender was 360 days, NOT 365 days so the 2520 years actually equal 2483 years for us. From here we subtract the amount of years from the end of the Babylonian captivity, which was 536bc as mentioned above... from 2,483.... the answer is 1948ad. The year Israel was reinstated.

These invisible hosts of heaven not seen by mortal man, again visited the Israelites when threatened with destruction by the Egyptians.

The following news appeared in the June 26th issue of "The Jerusalem Post," Israel's daily English newspaper, as follows,

Hundreds of trucks and armoured vehicles broke down without getting anywhere near the battlefront.

A high percentage of Egyptian fighter planes are known to have been mechanically unprepared for battle when war began.

The Egyptian radar warning system appears to have broken down completely.

In Cairo alerts were sounded after Israeli planes had attacked airfields and flown home. On several occassions the "all clear" was given while Israeli aircraft were approaching target.

Troops returning from the Sinai front spoke of a failure of military strategists and communications.

Whole regiments were surrounded when their flanks were exposed by uncoordinated retreats.

Egyptian army headquarters had little control over their forces once the battle had begun.

Columns of trucks and tanks were abandoned for lack of fuel supplies.

Discipline often broke and collapsed in the face of the Israeli assault.

One Colonel whose vehicle broke down was ignored by army drivers when he tried to flag down alternative transport.

Egypt had some of its crack troops in the Sinai desert, veterans of the Yemen campaign. Most of these units were destroyed.

The same paper reports that two thousand million dollars of Russian military equipment, consisting of tanks, small arms and ammunition, by the tons scattered all over the Sinai Peninsula is being gathered and assembled for the use of Israel.

Two train loads of poison gas was also found on the Peninsula and captured.

Israel has again been miraculously saved and delivered from her enemies, by that wonderful intervening hand of the Almighty who has delivered her repeatedly in times past, and WHO still promisies as follows:

"Hear the word of the LORD, O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off, and say, He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock. 11 For the LORD hath redeemed Jacob, and ransomed him from the hand of him that was stronger than he. 12 Therefore they shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and shall flow together to the goodness of the LORD, for wheat, and for wine, and for oil, and for the young of the flock and of the herd: and their soul shall be as a watered garden; and they shall not sorrow any more at all. 13 Then shall the virgin rejoice in the dance, both young men and old together: for I will turn their mourning into joy, and will comfort them, and make them rejoice from their sorrow. " Jeremiah 31:10 to 13.

"Therefore all they that devour thee shall be devoured; and all thine adversaries, every one of them, shall go into captivity; and they that spoil thee shall be a spoil, and all that prey upon thee will I give for a prey. 17 For I will restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds, saith the LORD; because they called thee an Outcast, saying, This is Zion, whom no man seeketh after. " - Jeremiah 30:16, and 17.

Newspapers and magazines throughout the world, that are not Pro-Rome, or Pro-Communist, have reported the long threatened Israel-Arab war, as amazing, and astonishing.

Never before in the history of warfare in recent times, has there ever been such a lightning victory by so few against so many.

Israel was not just fighting against the millions of surrounding Egyptians, Jordanians, Syrians, etc., but also against Russia, with hundreds of her officers in charge of hundreds of millions of dollar worth of the most modem war armament.

The world in general knows that Russia was back of the movement to wipe Israel off of the map, and now she smarts with loss and defeat with the remainder of her allies. Truly Russia has been turned back, and "hooks put into her jaws". - Ezek. 38:4.

Life Magazine has devoted most of one issue to this miraculous event of modern time, and says: "Israel's victory On five fronts in a short sixty hours, is absolutely astonishing".

In all of the news magazines, and newpapers, we do not find anything attributing the astonishing events of June 5th., 6th., and 7th., to divine intervention or giving the Creator credit for having again fought for Israel, as in ancient times.

There is so much infidelity modernism, and unbelief now, that to give the Almighty any credit, would be extremely unpopular, to an unbelieving world, and especially to the 400 million Communists who believe that "God is Dead."

Many miracles, however did happen which agree perfectly with the Biblical narratives of ancient times when Our Mighty God, and Creator of Heaven and earth, fought for ancient Israel.

These miraculous happenings are being circulated all over Israel, however, they did not get publicity through secular newspapers. by A.N. Dugger

By 7:30 a.m., two hundred Israeli Air Force (IAF) planes were in the air heading towards Egyptian air bases. Though flying very low so as not to be detected by scores of Arab radar sites, a Jordanian radar facility detected an unusually large number of aircraft heading towards the sea. The officer on duty immediately sent a message, "Inab," the code-word for war, to Jordan military headquarters in Amman. The message was encoded and passed on to Egypt’s defense minister in Cairo.

Miraculously, however, the Egyptian coding frequencies had been changed the previous day, and the Jordanians were not updated.

That morning, with the element of surprise in their favor, the IAF obliterated six Egyptian airfields--two in Egypt proper and four in the Sinai Desert--destroying 204 Egyptian planes, half of their air force. Though Egypt had sufficient anti-aircraft ammunition to destroy all the attacking Israeli planes, miraculously, no order was given for these missiles to be launched. The Israelis accomplished their mission with practically no resistance.

The total air superiority achieved on the first day of the war drastically reduced the enemies' combat abilities.

11. "The Jews are human beings, but the nations of theworld are not human beings but beasts..." -Saba Mecia 114, 6

13. "Jehovah created the non-Jew in human form so thatthe Jew would not have to be served by beasts. The non-Jew is consequently an animal in human form, and condemned to serve the Jew day and night." - Midrasch Talpioth, p. 225-L

33. "A Jewish mid-wife is not only permitted but she iscompelled to help a Jewish mother on Saturday (Jewish Sabbath) and when so doing to do anything which otherwise would desecrate the Saturday. But it is forbidden to help a non-Jewish woman even if it should be possible to help her without desecrating the Saturday, because she is to be considered only as ananimal." -Schulchan gruch, Orach Chaim 330

The massive central door in the side of Noah's Ark was opened the first crowd of curious townsfolk to behold the wonder. Of course, it's only a replica of the Biblical Ark , built by Dutch Creationist Johan Huibers as a testament to his faith in the literal truth of the Bible.

The ark is 150 cubits long, 30 cubits high and 20 cubits wide. That's two-thirds the length of a football field and as high as a three-story house.

Life-size models of giraffes, elephants, lions, crocodiles, zebras, bison and other animals greet visitors as they arrive in the main hold.

A contractor by trade, Huibers built the ark of cedar and pine. Biblical Scholars debate exactly what the wood used by Noah would have been.

Huibers did the work mostly with his own hands, using modern tools and with occasional help from his son Roy. Construction began in May 2005. On the uncovered top - deck not quite ready in time for the opening - will come a petting zoo, with baby lambs and chickens, and goats, and one camel.

Visitors on the first day were stunned. "It's past Comprehension" said Mary Louise Starosciak, who happened to be bicycling by with her husband while on vacation when they saw the ark looming over the local landscape.

"I knew the story of Noah, but I had no idea the boat would have been so big." There is enough space near the keel for a 50-seat film theater where kids can watch a video that tells the story of Noah and his ark. Huibers, a Christian man, said he hopes the project will renew interest in Christianity in the Netherlands , where church going has fallen dramatically in the past 50 years.

Now that I am old and Gray...give me the time to tell this new generation (and their children too) about all your mighty miracles. Psalm 71:18

Mighty impressive, eh! Imagine what it must have been like without all of today's tools, without electricity, etc.

MIGHTY IMPRESSIVE!

My font won't get any bigger than that or I'd make it bigger!

With God all things are possibleMatthew 19:26

mariaAdministrateur Messages postés : 15133

Posté le 03/02/2010 03:59:49 (03/02/2010 12:59:49)

CAN US DONATIONS FUND ILLEGAL SETTLEMENTS?

Barbara Ferguson | Arab News

WASHINGTON: When Barack Obama was elected president a year ago, his stance on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict seemed clear: Israel had to freeze its illegal settlement building, then talks could proceed. Little by little this prerequisite has been pushed to the back burner.

This fall, with Obama’s approval down to the low 50s, the president moved away from the freeze, and focused on just getting Palestinians and Israelis to the same table.

Compared to the Bush Administration’s policy toward settlement construction — which was allegedly encouraged behind closed doors at the highest levels — President Obama’s approach has been called “harsh” by the Israeli government but heralded by those who wish to see the US broker a two-state solution. Like its predecessors for the past three decades, the Obama administration, however, has turned a blind eye to what makes the building and maintenance of these illegal settlements possible — donations from American charities.

Which begs the question: Can tax-exempt American donations be used to fund activities that are explicitly opposed to American foreign policy? No, according to a 1983 decision by the US Supreme Court that ruled tax-exempt groups cannot oppose American policy.

This has lead the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) to hire lawyers and make a legal effort to strip the not-for-profit status of American groups that fund settlements.

Two decades ago, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) reported that donations to Israel worldwide were already reaching $1 billion per year; 70 percent of this amount came from the United States.

Case in point: Bloomberg reported last summer that Renco Group Inc. founder Ira Rennert and bingo entrepreneur Irving Moskowitz were among US donors “who have given $25.4 million in five years to build Jewish homes in Arab parts of Jerusalem — the same areas that President Barack Obama is pressing Israel to stop such construction.”

US citizens such as Moskowitz are making donations to the settlement enterprise in direct contravention of official US policy, but many of these donations are also tax-deductible and deliberately sent to fund construction in areas, which are recognized by the US, the EU and the UN to be under illegal occupation by Israel.

According to Gershom Gorenberg, author of “The Accidental Empire: Israel and the Birth of the Settlements,” donors like Moskowitz “want to prevent any political compromise that might lead to a peace agreement.”

According to David Ignatius, who recently wrote in the Washington Post: “Often the US charities will specify that their gifts are going to charities in Israel, even though the recipients are in the West Bank, which the United States regards as occupied territory.

As such, an estimated $50 billion has been spent to fund the settlements, according to Israeli President Shimon Peres.

David Ignatius added: “A search of Internal Revenue Service records identified 28 US charitable groups that made a total of $33.4 million in tax-exempt contributions to settlements and related organizations between 2004 and 2007.

Feb. 25: Two parts of an ancient Biblical manuscrïpt are seen at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem.

JERUSALEM — Two parts of an ancient biblical manuscrïpt separated across centuries and continents were reunited for the first time in a joint display Friday, thanks to an accidental discovery that is helping illuminate a dark period in the history of the Hebrew Bible.

The 1,300-year-old fragments, which are among only a handful of Hebrew biblical manuscrïpts known to have survived the era in which they were written, existed separately and with their relationship unknown, until a news photograph of one's public unveiling in 2007 caught the attention of the scholars who would eventually link them.

Together, they make up the text of the Song of the Sea, sung by jubilant Israelites after fleeing slavery in Egypt and witnessing the destruction of the pharaoh's armies in the Red Sea.

"The enemy said: 'I will pursue, I will overtake, I will divide the spoil. My lust shall be satisfied upon them, I will draw my sword, my hand shall destroy them,'" reads the song, which appears in the Book of Exodus. "Thou didst blow thy wind, the sea covered them. They sank like lead in the mighty waters."

An exhibit at Israel's national museum dedicated to the Song of the Sea is now bringing together the two long-separated pieces.

One page of the song, known as the Ashkar manuscrïpt, was previously housed in a rare books library at Duke University in North Carolina and was first displayed at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem in 2007.

That's when a photograph of the manuscrïpt in a local newspaper caught the eye of two Israeli paleographers, Mordechay Mishor and Edna Engel, who noticed it resembled a different page of Hebrew writing known as the London manuscrïpt, presently part of the private collection of Stephan Loewentheil of New York.

"The uniformity of the letters, the structure of the text, and the techniques used by the scribe ... it made it very clear to me," Engel said.

The relationship would not be so clear to a casual observer. The Ashkar manuscrïpt has been so blackened by exposure to the elements that the text is all but invisible, while the London manuscrïpt is legible and far better preserved. But after close study of ultraviolet images, the experts were able to confirm that the texts were not only written by the same scribe, but were also part of the same scroll.

Scholars believe the scroll was written around the seventh century somewhere in the Middle East, possibly in Egypt. It is not known how the two parts were separated or what happened to the rest of the manuscrïpt.

The museum arranged to have the London manuscrïpt brought to Jerusalem. The new exhibit chronicles how the Song of the Sea was written through various ancient manuscrïpts, from the 2,000-year-old Dead Sea Scrolls to the manuscrïpt known as the Aleppo Codex, written nearly a millennium later.

The reunification of the two pieces adds an important link in the chain, showing how the writing of the Hebrew Bible evolved through the so-called "silent" period — between the third and 10th centuries — from which nearly no Biblical texts survived. While in the Dead Sea Scrolls the song is arranged like prose, for example, in the newly reunited manuscrïpt it is written like a poem, the same way it appears in the Hebrew Bible today.

The manuscrïpts are "filling the gap," said Israel Museum curator Adolfo Roitman. "We can see we are dealing with a tradition that is still alive."

The museum exhibit displays the manuscrïpts along with other depictions of the Song of the Sea from the museum's permanent collection, including artistic renderings of the biblical passages in frescoes and Renaissance paintings and recordings of the song as it is chanted by Jews in different communities worldwide.

Jacob was the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham, so Jacob was Jewish. Rachel was Jacob's wife conceived and bare two sons : Joseph and Benjamin who where both Jewish. And Rachel walked with God. When she called his name Joseph, his first son, she said "May the Lord add to me another son; and Jacob was ninety-one years old when she bare him." Book of Jasher 31:21

"19 So Rachel died and was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem). 20 And Jacob set a pillar on her grave, which is the pillar of Rachel’s grave to this day." Genesis 35:19, New King James Version

"10 -And whilst they were going on the road, and there was yet but a little way to come to Ephrath, Rachel bare a son ans she had hard labor and she died.

11 - And Jacob buried her in the way to Eprath, which is Bethlehem, and he set a pillar upen her grave, which is there unto this day; and the days of Rachel were forty-five years and she died." Book of Jasher 36:10-11

Posted by RJ on March 8, 2010 at 8:40pm

Turkish PM Erdogan: 'Rachel's Tomb was never Jewish'

(JPost) Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Sunday continued his verbal assault on Israel, according to Saudi paper Al Wattan, which quoted him as saying that that al Aksa Mosque, the Cave of the Patriarchs and Rachel’s Tomb “were not and never will be Jewish sites, but Islamic sites.”

Erdogan was referring to Israel’s recent inclusion of the Cave of the Patriarchs and Rachel’s Tomb on its national heritage list, but it was unclear why he mentioned the Aksa Mosque, since that site was not included.

Speaking to Palestinian journalists, Erdogan reportedly said, "Palestine [was] always at the top of Turkey’s priorities." He expressed his support for the renewal of indirect talks between Israel and the Palestinians. Donning a cloak of pan-Islamic identity, Erdogan told Al Wattan that he “loves my brothers in Fatah and my brothers in Hamas to the same degree, because they are my Muslim brothers and I cannot distinguish between them.”

Turkey’s prime minister began criticizing Israel in the wake of Operation Cast Lead last year, and has been punctilious in voicing his opinion on Israel’s actions since. In the recent past, he sharply criticized Israel during press conferences with the Lebanese prime minister and with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Turkey also recently distanced itself from the United States, withdrawing the ambassador from Washington after a congressional committee decided to recognize the killing of Armenians during World War I as a genocide. In a sign of tensions between Israel and Turkey, Ankara did not seek the help of Jewish lobbies in Washington, and these groups, which have traditionally advocated on behalf of Turkey, refrained this time from pressing Congress not to accept the resolution.